14th July, 2009

Ocimum Biosolutions is awarded U.S. Patent for the quality control of gene expression

Ocimum Biosolutions, Hyderabad, India. And Gene Logic (U.S.A.) a leading genomics company, provides an integrated and comprehensive databases for the quality control of gene expression. On July 14th  Ocimum announced that company’s U.S. patent no. 7,558,411 B2 entitled “Method and system for managing and querying gene expression data according to quality” has been issued which proved to be a land mark in the path of controlled usage of gene expression.

Gene expression is the method of retrieving information from a gene. Gene expression analysis is the key process for the synthesis of functional gene products. Gene expression has got its versatile fields of applications in the disease management, drug discovery, pharmacogenomics, toxicogenomics and molecular diagnostics.

The invention focused on a method and integrated system in order to maintain the quality of analysis of gene expression data from DNA probe arrays. The invention provides a centralized solution for DNA quality control process viz. viewing, masking and pass/failing DNA probe microarrays or equivalents like "chips", making use of image processing (IP) metrics and limits. This method also provides a broad evaluation mechanism within a single or multiple microarray evaluation for the purposes of quality control. This invention is a milestone for the company to come up with a unique solution in this era of gene therapy.

GOOGLE PLANS TO SELL E-BOOKS THIS YEAR

Google plans to launch a program of selling e-books this year in a move to compete with e-commerce leader Amazon.com Inc. Google intents to build a digital book ecosystem to allow publishing partners to sell access to their titles, even if buyers don't have committed book readers.

The difference between Google and Amazon would be that the search giant aims to let Google Book Search users "buy access" to copyrighted books with any Web-enabled computer, e-reader or mobile phone. Persons accessing books through Google would be able to read titles online and temporarily store them in their Internet browsers and could also read them offline. Publishers are allowed to set their own prices, although Google reserves the right to discount titles at its own expense.

GOOGLE CHINA DROPS BEIJING FREE RIDER

Google began its formal use of Chinese name 谷歌(Guge) in 2006 when establishing its Chinese subsidiary Google China. Within the first hour of its announcement, a company with the name Beijing Guge Technology obtained government approval to be in business. The fight between the two namesake companies ensued.

In the trademark and unfair competition case concerning 谷歌, Beijing No.1 Intermediate People's Court held that the Beijing company had registered the mark in bad faith. The Court mentioned that Beijing Guge intentionally used Guge in its trademark that led to confusion and that such acts violated principles of fairness and good faith. The Court ordered Beijing Guge to cease use of the trade name and request name change before relevant authority to ensure the modified name not inclusive of ?? while paying Google China 100,000 yuan in damages.

EU TO MONITOR PHARMA PATENT AGREEMENTS

The European Commission has said that major pharmaceutical companies will come under intensified antitrust scrutiny when making deals with smaller generic drug makers.

Company practices such as patent settlements to keep generics out of the market even after a patent has lapsed, and unnecessary patent litigation are responcible for higher drug prices, the commission said. "Defensive patenting strategies that mainly focus on excluding competitors without pursuing innovative efforts will remain under scrutiny," the commission said. The commission will carry out focused monitoring of settlements that limit or delay the market entry of generic drugs to ensure that settlements between large pharmaceuticals and generic companies aren't concluded at the expense of consumers.

The commission opened an antitrust case against Les Laboratoires Servier and a number of generic companies for agreements that may have hindered the market entry of a generic cardio vascular medicine. The commission said that there is an urgent need for the establishment of a Community patent and a unified patent litigation system in Europe.

MARS LOSES BID TO TRADEMARK SHAPE OF BOUNTY BAR

Mars Inc., a Food company and the maker of M&Ms candy and Snickers has lost a bid at the European Union’s second-highest court to regain region-wide trademark rights over the shape of its coconut-flavoured Bounty chocolate bar.

The European Court of First Instance said the shape of the candy bar cannot be sufficiently distinguished from other shapes commonly used for chocolate bars. The ruling follows a six-year fight by the McLean, Virginia-based company to fend off German competitor Ludwig Schokolade GmbH.

Mars got an EU-wide protection for the chocolate bar shape in 2003 from the Office of Harmonization for the Internal Market, the region’s trademark agency and the protection was lifted in 2007 when Ludwig Schokolade appealed against it.

VIZIO WINS US CUSTOMS RULING ON FUNAI PATENT CLAIMS

The United States Customs and Border Protection agency ("Customs") issued a ruling in favour of VIZIO; that all current models of VIZIO televisions do not infringe a U.S. Patent held by Funai Electric Company. This would enable VIZIO to continue importing America's fastest selling line of televisions without interruption. VIZIO is the number one selling brand of flat panel HDTVs in the U.S.

VIZIO has filed separate anti-trust and patent infringement claims against Funai for unlawfully and unfairly discriminating against VIZIO in the licensing and enforcement of its patent.

IBM TO PATENT DATA MASK

IBM has filed for patents on a new technology, Masking Gateway for Enterprises (MAGEN) that can selectively hide data contained in files that hold sensitive information such as healthcare or financial records. IBM's MAGEN was developed in the company's labs in Haifa, Israel; Magen is the Hebrew word for "shield".
It differs from other data masking products in that it does not make changes to the data file itself but it treats onscreen information as a picture and uses optical character recognition (OCR) technology to render parts of the image that are deemed sensitive unreadable.

IBM said MAGEN is at the proof-of-concept stage, and the technology could be used to prevent workers at a claims processing center from viewing patient healthcare data while still being able to access the information needed to put through an insurance claim.

IBM has filed for patents on two aspects of MAGEN, one for the unique way of manipulating images and the other for a word scrambling system.

ANGIOCHEM GRANTED FIRST U.S. PATENT COVERING ANGIOPEP-2

AngioChem, a biotechnology company discovering and developing drugs that are exclusively capable of crossing the blood-brain barrier, has been granted a patent by the U.S. Patent and Trademark office. The patent is entitled “Aprotinin polypeptides for transporting a compound across the blood-brain barrier” and covers the Angiopep-2 EPiC peptide and conjugates, including ANG1005. ANG1005 is AngioChem’s lead drug candidate currently being evaluated in two distinct Phase I/II clinical trials for cancers of the brain, and positive clinical data were recently presented on ANG1005 at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) annual meeting in April 2009.

“This patent is part of the company's large EPiC intellectual property portfolio and we believe that the issuance of this U.S. patent recognizes the novelty and inventiveness of Angiochem’s platform technology for efficient transport of an array of therapeutics across the blood brain barrier,” stated Dr. Jean-Paul Castaigne, CEO of AngioChem.

SUN PHARMA TO LICENSE KEY ESCITALOPRAM PATENT APPLICATIONS TO LUNDBECK

Sun Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. along with Caraco Pharmaceutical Laboratories, Ltd ("Caraco") has entered into agreement with Forest Laboratories, Inc., Forest Laboratories Holdings, Ltd., and H. Lundbeck A/S (collectively, "Forest") to settle the legal proceedings related to Lexapro® (escitalopram oxalate) tablets.

Sun Pharma will license certain patent applications related to the synthesis of escitalopram and citalopram in exchange for an upfront payment and, if the technology is used, royalties on sales to Lundbeck. Forest will provide licenses to Caraco for any patents related to Lexapro® and with respect to the marketing of Caraco’s generic version of the product. Caraco will take over the commercialization and sale of several products from Forest's Inwood business. Caraco will pay Forest an undisclosed advance against royalties and royalties on net sales of these products. And Forest will reimburse Caraco for a portion of their costs related to this litigation.

These agreements will be subject to review by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission.