Justin Turner KC appeared for the Claimants and Andrew Lykiardopoulos KC appeared for the Defendants in this action to revoke the patent and invalidate the SPC owned by the First Defendant and exclusively licensed to the Second Defendant.
The patent in suit, EP 196, claimed the compound enzalutamide for the treatment of hormone refractory prostate cancer, sold as ‘Xtandi’. Accord relied on two pieces of prior art independently: a series of slides and a poster. Each disclosed what was agreed to be the closest prior art molecule referred to as RD162. The structure of RD162 differed from that of the claimed compound RD162’ (enzalutamide) by virtue of a different substituent at the bottom right of the central thiahydantoin ring.
Mr Justice Mellor rejected the Claimants’ argument that it would have been immediately obvious to the skilled team, in this case comprising a skilled cancer biologist and a skilled medicinal chemist, to develop RD162’ starting from each of the pieces of prior art. Mr Justice Mellor also rejected the sufficiency attack on the patent, holding that it disclosed a novel molecule RD162’ and that it was plausible that RD162’ would work.