ImClone Systems - Yeda/Aventis/Imclone Patent Dispute

Yeda/Aventis/Imclone Patent Dispute

Yeda Research and Development, a company set up to commercialize and market the products of research at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel, challenged the Aventis-owned patent, licensed by Imclone, for the use of anti-Epidermal growth factor receptor antibodies in combination with chemotherapy, to slow the growth of certain tumors. This is the so-called '866' patent which was filed in 1989 by Rhone-Poulenc-Rorer and issued in 2001, on which Joseph Schlessinger was listed as first-named inventor.

Joseph Schlessinger's former colleagues at the Weizmann Institute, in particular Michael Sela, claimed to have come up with this concept alongside Schlessinger when they worked together there years earlier, and Yeda challenged the Aventis patent in the United States. Schlessinger testified in court that the idea of combining the anti-EGFR antibody that his lab had developed with chemotherapy in cancer treatment was his own idea. However, the Weizmann Institute scientists provided extensive documentation that they had been developing this idea using an antibody against that Schlessinger's laboratory had developed and generated, and that he had given them for these studies. Schlessinger claims to have initiated the idea of this use in combination therapy, but had not documented his research and ideas as thoroughly, leaving him forced to rely on his recollections of the events that led to the patent filing some 17 years before Yeda mounted their challenge.

The court ruled that Yeda are the sole owners of the disputed patent in the U.S., while Yeda and Sanofi-Aventis co-own the 866 Patent's foreign counterparts. Following the ruling, ImClone and Sanofi-Aventis agreed to settle the dispute with Yeda, for $120 million, with each company paying Yeda $60 million. In return, ImClone were also granted a worldwide license to technology covered by the 866 Patent, and agreed to pay a small royalty on Erbitux sales to Yeda.