BioNtech, Pfizer files complaint against CureVac in U.S. over COVID-19 Vaccine patent claims

On Tuesday, the COVID-19 vaccine maker, BioNTech said that it and partner Pfizerhave filed a complaint with the U.S. District Court in Massachusetts, seeking a judgment that they did not contravene U.S. patents held by rival CureVac.

The lawsuit filed registered on Monday said CureVac is trying to profit from the success of BioNTech and Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccines after CureVac’s efforts to make its own vaccine became unsuccessful.

Earlier this month, CureVac filed a patent lawsuit in Germany against BioNTech over its use of mRNA technology and did not rule out further legal action against BioNTech’s partner Pfizer or rival mRNA vaccine maker Moderna Inc.

BioNTech said that CureVac’s U.S. patents were equivalent to German patents invoked by CureVac in the German court case.

BioNTech and Pfizer asked the Boston court to announce that their Comirnaty vaccine does not breach three CureVac patents related to RNA-based vaccines. The companies told the court that Comirnaty does not work in the same way as CureVac’s patented technology.

“One of the patents concerns messenger RNA (mRNA) connected to lipid nanoparticles (LNPs), which the vaccines use to deliver the molecules safely into the body. Pfizer, BioNTech, and Moderna have been hit with U.S. patent lawsuits by other biotech companies this year over the LNP technology used in their vaccines,” a source as per Reuters.

Pfizer has said that this year it expects $32 billion in revenue from Comirnaty.

While CureVac says in a statement it was aware of BioNTech’s legal action but had not yet been formally served. “We will review the matter legally in detail and represent our position accordingly,” it further adds.