After prevailing in its patent infringement lawsuit against BGI Genomics, Illumina cemented its victory by getting a permanent injunction barring the Chinese sequencing firm and its subsidiaries, including MGI Tech, from selling its sequencers and reagents in the US. Illumina claims the BGI products infringe Illumina patents and succeeded in securing a preliminary injunction preventing their sale in June 2020, pending the outcome of the underlying litigation.
The only downside for Illumina is that like the preliminary injunction, the permanent order allows BGI to begin marketing its products in the US as long as actual sales don’t take place until after the Illumina patents expire. “With this in mind, we will announce our product launch decisions in the US in the near future,” MGI said.
But the MGI spin can’t conceal Illumina’s clear victory in the case. In addition to making the preliminary injunction permanent, the Northern District of California federal court upheld the $8 million damages award in Illumina’s favor, while overturning the jury’s decision to invalidate an Illumina patent for “Labeled nucleotides.” It also denied BGI’s request for a new trial seeking to invalidate other Illumina patents.
Still, the war between Illumina and BGI isn’t over. BGI is considering appealing the legal validity of the jury’s award. Meanwhile, MGI’s lawsuit against Illumina for violating antitrust laws and infringing patents owned by its US affiliate Complete Genomics is scheduled to go to trial next month.