A Medical Device Daily

Millipore (Billerica, Massachusetts) said it has filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts against W.L. Gore & Associates (Newark, Delaware) for infringement of Millipore's patent rights under U.S. Patent No. 7,293,477, "Disposable, Pre-Sterilized Fluid Receptacle Sampling Device," by selling one or more of its STA-PURE samplers.

Gore's product competes with components of Millipore's NovaSeptum sampling system for the pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical industries, according to the company. The NovaSeptum sampling system is a sterile, disposable, completely enclosed sampling system for aseptic and sterile processes, Millipore says. The company notes that sampling is critical for biopharmaceuticals; an imprecise or false positive result can lead to batch loss and may also require repeat sampling and analysis at additional costs.

"This filing reflects our intention to vigorously defend our intellectual property, which is a fundamental component of the innovation we provide to our customers," said Jean-Paul Mangeolle, president of Millipore's Bioprocess Division.

According to Roland Heinrich, VP of Millipore's Process Monitoring Tools, "Millipore's NovaSeptum sampling system has broad industry acceptance. With our strong patent position, I am confident we will remain an industry pioneer in sampling systems."

In other legalities, Endocare (Irvine, California) and Galil Medical (Yokneam, Israel) reported a settlement agreement to terminate its merger agreement and the settlement of all related litigation in Delaware Chancery Court.

The merger agreement between Galil and Endocare was first disclosed in November (MDD, Nov. 14, 2008). However, the deal got held up by an investigation by the Federal Trade Commission. Last month Endocare said it was terminating the agreement and would be acquired by urology services provider HealthTronics (Austin, Texas) in a cash and stock deal worth about $16 million (MDD, June 9, 2009).

Both Galil and Endocare develop cryotherapy products for the prostate cancer market.

Galil filed suit against Endocare for an alleged breach of the merger agreement last month (MDD, June 15, 2009).