OrbusNeich Medical Inc. and its subsidiary, Orbus International B.V., (collectively, "OrbusNeich") today announced that they have commenced a patent infringement lawsuit in Ireland against Boston Scientific Corporation (NYSE: BSX) and two of its Irish subsidiaries (collectively, "Boston Scientific").
The lawsuit alleges that Boston Scientific are infringing two European patents covering certain novel stent designs. The two patents, held by OrbusNeich, are designated EP 2 311 412 and EP 1 341 482. OrbusNeich allege that the patents are infringed by a number of Boston Scientific's coronary stent systems, including the "PROMUS Element™", "PROMUS Element Plus™", "OMEGA™", "TAXUS™", "SYNERGY™", and "Promus PREMIER™" lines of stents.
OrbusNeich are seeking damages for the infringement and an injunction prohibiting Boston Scientific from manufacturing, offering for sale, marketing or stocking products that infringe the patents in Ireland.
Al Novak, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of OrbusNeich, said, "The lawsuit in Ireland is a continuation of our efforts to protect and enforce our intellectual property rights. We intend to vigorously pursue these efforts to prevent unlawful competitive practices and protect our unique technologies throughout the world."
On February 20, 2013, OrbusNeich commenced patent infringement actions in Germany and the Netherlands against Boston Scientific and its distribution affiliates in those countries.
On February 11, 2013, OrbusNeich received a favorable ruling from the European Patent Office (EPO) in connection with EP 1 341 482, one of the two patents asserted against Boston Scientific in these lawsuits. The EPO upheld the validity of claim 1 of the '482 patent, as amended, over an opposition filed by Boston Scientific and Terumo Kabushiki Kaisha. The EPO found that claim 1 of the '482 patent met all requirements of the European Patent Convention, and that the stents covered by the claim were novel and inventive over the prior art.
About OrbusNeich
OrbusNeich is a global company that designs, develops, manufactures and markets innovative medical devices for the treatment of vascular diseases. Current products are the world's first pro-healing stent, the Genousâ„¢ Stent, as well as other stents and balloons marketed under the names of Azuleâ„¢, R stentâ„¢, Scoreflexâ„¢, Sapphireâ„¢, Sapphire IIâ„¢ and Sapphire NCâ„¢. Development stage products include the COMBO Dual Therapy Stentâ„¢, the world's first dual therapy stent. OrbusNeich is headquartered in Hong Kong and has operations in Shenzhen, China; Fort Lauderdale, Fla.; Hoevelaken, The Netherlands; and Tokyo, Japan. OrbusNeich supplies medical devices to interventional cardiologists in more than 60 countries.
