Abbott files lawsuit in High Court against rival over alleged patent infringement
ABBOTT Medical Ireland, the Irish subsidiary of international pharmaceutical company Abbott, has filed a lawsuit at the High Court in Dublin against rival Edwards Lifesciences over an alleged patent infringement related to a heart valve.
Abbott filed the lawsuit in the Commercial High Court of Dublin in February, against Edwards Lifesciences, a US medical technology company. According to a filing by Edwards last week, Abbott alleges that the Edwards’ PASCAL heart valve repair system infringes certain claims of its Irish national patent. A trial date has been scheduled for January 12, 2021.
According to a spokeswoman for Edwards, Abbott has initiated litigation that now involves multiple patents in multiple venues, and will likely yield court actions over an “extended period of time”.
“Edwards continues to strongly believe that its differentiated PASCAL technology does not infringe the patent invoked by Abbott in Ireland and we are prepared to vigorously defend our position,” she said. “The PASCAL system represents the culmination of years of innovation by Edwards to develop a novel, differentiated and advanced leaflet repair platform for this prevalent and undertreated disease.
“We are disappointed that Abbott’s actions could impact availability of the PASCAL therapy to doctors and patients in Ireland and elsewhere.”
According to Edwards’ quarterly results, lawsuits have also been filed by Abbott in the US, UK, Germany, Switzerland and Italy. Edwards has also filed a lawsuit against Abbott in California.
Abbott Ireland employs 3,000 people across nine sites here, including in Dublin, Donegal, Sligo and Longford. It has its EMEA finance shared services centre in Dublin. Abbott failed to respond to a request for comment.
In April 2019, Edwards Lifesciences announced it would invest €160m in a new manufacturing plant in Castletroy, Co Limerick. It said the new facility, which will make heart valves, would employ 600 people. The facility is to be finished by 2021.
Edwards Lifesciences already employs around 50 people in Shannon, Co Clare.