Ambry Genetics Defeats Appeal By Myriad Genetics, Inc. To Restrict Market For Breast-Ovarian Cancer Genetic Testing

ALISO VIEJO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Ambry Genetics defeated an appeal by Myriad Genetics to block competing DNA-based tests to determine hereditary risk for breast and ovarian cancer after a United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit held today that claims from three of the patents covering DNA-based BRCA1 and BRCA2 tests Myriad is asserting against Ambry do not contain subject matter eligible for patent protection. “Myriad did not create or alter any of the genetic information encoded in the BRCA1 or BRCA2 genes. The location and order of the nucleotides existed in nature before Myriad found them,” the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit said in an opinion posted today on the court’s docket. The Court of Appeals also relied on the 2013 Supreme Court opinion finding other of Myriad’s claims patent-ineligible and observed, “As the Supreme Court made clear, neither naturally occurring compositions of matter, nor synthetically created compositions that are structurally identical to the naturally occurring compositions, are patent eligible.”

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