INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

The production and commercialization of GRNOPC1 is protected by three separate patent estates owned by or exclusively licensed to Geron. Geron funded the work at the University of Wisconsin-Madison that led to the original derivation of hESCs. Accordingly, Geron maintains an exclusive license to the issued fundamental WARF patents covering hESCs for the production of neural cells, cardiomyocytes and pancreatic islets for therapeutic applications. The validity of the WARF patent estate was recently confirmed by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in a re-examination proceeding. Additionally, the GRNOPC1 product is protected by an exclusive license to Geron from the University of California covering technology developed in a research collaboration between Geron and the University of California scientists that led to the discovery of the method to produce oligodendrocyte progenitors from hESCs. Finally, the product is protected by an expanding patent estate of pending and issued patents owned by Geron covering novel technologies for undifferentiated hESC expansion, scalable cell manufacturing methods and the production of specific therapeutic cell preparations.