In a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision, a patent claim involving Myriad Genetics' (MYGN 0.05%) complementary DNA, or cDNA, has been upheld, according to a company announcement. In addition to Myriad's patent victory, however, five of its isolated DNA-related claims were denied by the court.
While not at issue in the Supreme Court's ruling, Myriad stated the Supreme Court also noted its BRCA 1 and BRCA 2 as method claims, supporting an earlier circuit court statement that said, "As the first party with knowledge of the [BRCA1 and BRCA2] sequences, Myriad was in an excellent position to claim applications to that knowledge." Myriad's BRACAnalysis testing has been utilized "by more than a million women" to determine a patient's risk of contracting ovarian and breast cancer, according to the statement.
Regarding the court's decision to uphold its cDNA claim, and reinforce the method claims relating to BRCA 1 and BRCA 2, Myriad president and CEO Peter Meldrum said the ruling, "underscored the patent eligibility of our method claims, ensuring strong intellectual property protection for our BRACAnalysis test moving forward."
