Shares of Farmingdale, New York-based Enzo Biochem fell as low as 17 percent on Tuesday after a federal appeals court threw out a patent infringement ruling it won against Applera, a division of Thermo Fisher Scientific.
The original $61 million ruling for Enzo claimed Appelera has used patented genetic screening methods by Enzo designed to read genetic code.
But in its reversal on Monday, judges for the 2nd District U.S. Court of Appeals said it erred in the original verdict.
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“Because we agree with Applera that the district court erred in its claim construction by finding that the claims at issue covered direct detection, we reverse the district court’s claim construction, vacate the judgment of infringement,” the ruling stated.
Enzo’s patent, "Modified polynucleotides and methods of preparing same," expired in 2004.
While investors were clearly shaken by the news, Enzo said it would not accept the ruling and instead requested a retrial over the alleged infringement.
“Counter to the District Court’s construction of the ‘767 patent as allowing for directly-detectable labels on nucleotides and polynucleotides, and counter to the jury’s verdict that the patent describes such labelling, the Court of Appeals, held such labelling excluded by claim 1 of that patent,” the company said in a statement.
While Enzo’s stock had rebounded slightly by late-day trading on the New York Stock Exchange, share prices fell as low as $2.55 per share earlier in the day.
Here’s the full ruling:
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