A Medical Device Daily

Sigma-Aldrich (St. Louis) and Oxford BioMedica (San Diego/Oxford, UK), a gene therapy company, said they received a court order confirming the validity of intellectual property which Oxford BioMedica owns and is licensed to Sigma-Aldrich.

The ruling was part of the construction of patent claim terms in an infringement suit that the companies have filed against Open Biosystems (Cambridge, Massachusetts/Huntsville, Alabama), pending in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri.

The suit alleges that Open Bio infringes U.S. Patent Nos. 6,924,123 and 7,056,699, owned by Oxford BioMedica, by Open Bio's sale of, among other products, its Lentiviral shRNAmir Library.

U.S. District Judge Charles Shaw concluded: "the constructions of the disputed terms and phrases proposed by plaintiff are correct."

David Smoller, president, research biotechnology business unit of Sigma-Aldrich said that the order reinforces Sigma's argument "that the Oxford Biomedica patents are 'core patents' in the RNA-interference field, and validates Sigma's decision to license these patents and make other significant investments in creating a comprehensive portfolio of intellectual property ... ."

Oxford BioMedica says its LentiVector system can be used to deliver shRNA-encoding DNA to cells to enable RNA Interference (RNAi) experiments.

Based on discoveries by Oxford Biomedica's Drs. Susan and Alan Kingsman and others, modified lentiviruses can be used as vectors, which enable RNAi to be employed to unlock the genetic code.

The Court Order states that the viral vector developed by the Kingsmans is expected to be useful as a "smart bomb" to safely "deliver new genetic material into specific cells, such as cells that do not divide or that divide slowly," giving the delivery of genes that produce dopamine into a Parkinson's disease patient's brain cells, as an example.

BioMedica develops gene-based therapeutics with a focus on oncology and neurotherapy. Established in 1995 as a spin out from Oxford University, the company says it has expertise in gene delivery and in-house clinical, regulatory and manufacturing know-how.