Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, USA
April 2, 2014
Precision BioSciences, Inc., a leader in the field of site-specific genome engineering, today announced that the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has issued a Notice of Intent to Issue an Ex Parte Reexamination Certificate for Precision’s U.S. Patent No. 8,143,015 (the ‘015 patent). The ‘015 patent had been challenged by a third party as obvious in view of certain prior art. The USPTO disagreed and ruled that the claims were non-obvious without requiring any amendment to the patent. The ‘015 patent relates to a key aspect of Precision’s Directed Nuclease Editor (DNE) technology and enables the editing of large genomes with extremely high site flexibility and specificity.
“We are thrilled by the USPTO’s decision to uphold the claims of this important contribution to the field of genome editing,” said Precision BioSciences CEO Matthew Kane. “It is one thing to have an issued patent, it is quite another to have a patent that has successfully survived the reexamination procedure. We believe that this decision provides Precision with a near-unassailable IP position for our DNE genome engineering technology.”
Precision is represented in patent prosecution and reexamination proceedings by Michael Twomey and Andrej Barbic of WilmerHale.
Precision BioSciences’ mission is to continually provide, improve, and enable the world’s most powerful genome engineering technology. Precision’s proprietary Directed Nuclease Editor™ (DNE) technology enables the production of genome editing enzymes that can insert, remove, modify, and regulate essentially any gene in mammalian or plant cells.
Precision BioSciences’ vision is to be the conduit through which the world’s greatest genome engineering challenges are solved. Precision has successfully utilized its DNE technology to create innovative products in partnerships with many of the world’s largest biopharmaceutical and agbiotech firms. Internally, Precision is developing DNE-based product leads for agricultural, biologics manufacturing and human therapeutic applications.
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