Roche has successfully persuaded a European appeals panel to revoke a patent held by Illumina’s subsidiary, Verinata Health, for detecting fetal DNA in maternal blood. The European Patent Office (EPO) ruled that the patent lacked an inventive step, as a prior application from Ariosa Diagnostics, a Roche unit, had already described a similar method.
Initially, the EPO Opposition Division upheld Verinata’s patent, claiming priority from a 2011 U.S. patent application. However, Roche convinced the appeals board that Verinata’s and the U.S. application’s claims were not identical, shifting the priority date and making Ariosa’s application prior art.
This ruling follows other EPO setbacks for Illumina, which has lost multiple patents related to DNA sequencing. Despite the decision, Illumina maintains that the revoked patent is not a key part of its extensive noninvasive prenatal testing portfolio.
Roche was represented by Maiwald.
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