The China National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA) has upheld a key patent surrounding the CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing technology, rejecting an invalidation challenge. The decision was announced by ERS Genomics Ltd, an Ireland-based company founded by Dr. Emmanuelle Charpentier, the Nobel prize-winning co-inventor of the technology, to manage and license access to the CRISPR gene editing technology.
The patent in question (CN201380038920.6) is co-owned by Charpentier, The Regents of the University of California, and the University of Vienna, collectively known as CVC. The patent covers “Methods and Compositions for RNA-guided Target DNA Modification and for RNA-guided Transcription Regulation”. CNIPA’s decision fully supports the patent, confirming that the priority application enables the use of CRISPR/Cas9 in eukaryotic cells. This ruling aligns with a similar decision from the Japanese Patent Office earlier this year.
Dr. Charpentier, along with US scientist Jennifer Doudna, was awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 2020 for their work on understanding and repurposing a bacterial immune system to create the CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing tool, which was published in June 2012. However, a competing team at the US-based Broad Institute published similar findings seven months later and also filed patents related to the technology. Since 2020, the US Patent Office has supported the validity of the Broad Institute’s patent over the CVC patent, contrasting with the market decisions in Japan and China.- Flcube.com
