CRISPR, the revolutionary gene editing technology, offers
tantalising promises of new disease treatments via precise and
efficient genome editing. As a consequence the technology has
caused widespread interest in the life sciences community and in
the imagination of the general public, as well as significant
investment in biotech companies that use this approach and legal
struggles around the patents on this technology.
A significant development in European chapter of the CRISPR
patents wars occurred on 16th and 17th January 2018 when the
European Patent Office's (EPO) Opposition Division revoked
EP2771468 – one of the key patents on CRISPR gene editing
technology held by The Broad Institute Inc, Massachusetts Institute
of Technology and the President and Fellows of Harvard College.
Why? The key reason was a problem with the priority claim in this
patent. Once the priority claim was considered invalid,
publications about this technology, including those made by
