A nonprofit cancer research institute has sued a Cambridge biotechnology company and one of its cofounders for more than $1 billion, alleging they took intellectual property developed at the institute and used it to launch a for-profit business.
The Leonard and Madlyn Abramson Family Cancer Research Institute, part of the Abramson Cancer Center at the University of Pennsylvania, contends in the lawsuit that Dr. Craig B. Thompson and Agios Pharmaceuticals Inc. are developing drugs to suppress cancer cells’ ability to grow and reproduce, based on novel research conducted during Thompson’s tenure as leader of the institute.
AAAS offers more including a link to a .pdf of the complaint.
The complaint says that Thompson was at first forthcoming about the possibility that he would form a company based on his work in cancer cell metabolism. Among other things, in 2007 he reported that his work suggested that the diabetes drug metformin might reduce the risk of cancer. But, the complaint continues, he did not alert the institute when he helped launch a company in August of 2007, which was later renamed Agios Pharmaceuticals.
Still, the lawsuit doesn’t state that Agios was willfully hiding the fact that Thompson was a co-founder. In 2009, the complaint notes, the company stated publicly that Thompson was one of three founders. A search of Agios’s press releases also found that the first put out by the company in 2008 list Thompson as a co-founder.
But the complaint alleges that Abramson didn’t know this at the time. In October 2011, it was publicly reported that Celgene was investing another $20 million in Agios on top of $130 million invested in April 2010. The April 2010 Agios press release announcing the deal did not name Thompson as a co-founder, the suit says.
And from Pharmalot:
Disputes over the origins and ownership of potentially valuable medical research happen regularly, although not every episode involves the ceo of a high-profile institution. For this reason, the spat may be more closely watched than most, especially given the prominence that Memorial Sloan-Kettering has among the elite in New York.
We asked Thompson for comment, but have not received a response and will update you accordingly. An Agios spokesman writes us to say that the drugmaker is “aware of the stories that are circulating, but the company has not formally been served with any legal documentation. Agios always has and will continue to operate with the highest level of integrity. We will not be commenting on this litigation further at this time.”
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