Decision in favor of Enzo could put a stake in AB’s $539.9M sequencing business.
The USPTO has found that Enzo Life Sciences’ allowed patent application on a DNA sequencing technology interferes with a patent held by California Institute of Technology and licensed exclusively to Applied Biosystems (AB). Enzo reports that it was declared the senior party in this dispute because its original application predates Cal Tech’s original application by over a year.
Enzo says that according to its legal counsel, the court decision is key to who owns the rights to this basic technology involving gel sequencing. AB’s DNA sequencing sector generated revenues of $539.9 million, or 29% of total revenues for fiscal year 2006.
According to Enzo, industry statistics shows that sales of products related to DNA sequencing exceed $5 billion per year. “While product and instrument sales in this market are substantial, we estimate that this figure is significantly higher when including diagnostic and therapeutic applications of the technology,” says Elazar Rabbani, PhD., CEO and chairman of Enzo Biochem.