Moderna sues Pfizer and BioNTech for patent infringement over mRNA COVID-19 vaccines

Moderna has filed a lawsuit against Pfizer and BionNTech over its mRNA technology that was used to produce COVID-19 vaccines. The American pharmaceutical and biotechnology company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is suing for patent infringement, and this was filed last week.

Moderna also publicly announced its move to go after Pfizer and BioNTech as it believes that the latter copied its technology to make the COVID-19 vaccine Comirnaty. The company said it had filed patents for this between 2010 and 2016.

The patents were said to cover the company’s mRNA technology which is groundbreaking science that was important to the development of Moderna's mRNA COVID-19 vaccine called the Spikevax.

"We are filing these lawsuits to protect the innovative mRNA technology platform that we pioneered, invested billions of dollars in creating, and patented during the decade preceding the COVID-19 pandemic," Stephane Bancel, Moderna’s chief executive officer, said in a press release. "This foundational platform, which we began building in 2010, along with our patented work on coronaviruses in 2015 and 2016, enabled us to produce a safe and highly effective COVID-19 vaccine in record time after the pandemic struck.”

In response, Pfizer said that the lawsuit against them was unexpected and denied it had infringed any of Moderna’s patents. Pfizer and BionNTech said they have not yet fully reviewed the surprising complaint but vowed they would face the litigation to defend and quash all the allegations concerning patent infringement.

In a written statement that was sent to CNN, Pfizer further said that they are confident in their intellectual property as their own COVID-19 vaccine was based on BioNTech's proprietary mRNA technology. The vaccine was also co-developed by Pfizer and BioNTech.

BioNTech said in a statement that it is aware of the reports that it was sued and accused of copying some patents from Moderna. The company firmly stated that all of its work is original, so it will vigorously defend against these patent infringement allegations.

Meanwhile, Moderna said that while it has sued Pfizer and BioNTech, it is not aiming to pull out Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine from the market. It is not planning to stop its future sales or seek damages for its sale, and what Moderna wants is simply a cut of its competitor's profits, as per Christopher Morten, who is an intellectual property law expert at Columbia University.