U.S. Patent and Trademark Office rejects Vitrolife patent claims

In November 2005, IVFonline.com, LLC, among others, was sued for patent infringement of U.S. Patent No. 6,838,235 (the '235 patent) by Vitrolife, AB of Sweden (Vitrolife).

In particular, Vitrolife claimed the exclusive right to market embryo culture medium containing alanyl-glutamine. Since that time, IVFonline has vigorously defended itself believing that the patent was invalid based upon the prior art and prior use.

In October 2006, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) re-examined the patent and rejected, as anticipated and/or obvious, all of the claims of the '235 patent. Vitrolife responded to the rejection but the PTO, for the second time, rejected all the '235 patent claims and closed prosecution.

A representative of IVFonline, said that the decision of the PTO to reject all of the patent claims reaffirms their position that the Vitrolife patent is invalid and thus, IVFonline was not in violation.

The representative went on to say that the IVFonline's scientific team, lead by Dr. John D. Biggers, had already developed a superior IVF embryo culture medium using glycyl-glutamine, which is now in the market and beginning to change the way reproductive specialists culture embryos.

IVFonline and its affiliates are world leaders in IVF products, especially IVF embryo culture media, branded as LifeGlobal, and have a broad group of loyal customers worldwide.