Law360, New York ( April 10, 2015, 2:51 PM EDT) -- Last month, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office's Patent Trial and Appeal Board issued three decisions invalidating patents that protect Genzyme Corp.'s drug Myozyme for Pompe disease in inter partes review proceedings initiated by competitor BioMarin Pharmaceutical Inc. — a first for a biologic. Indeed, IPR is being increasingly used by competitors in the pharmaceutical industry to knock out commercially significant patents that protect drug products. In 2014, more than 30 IPRs were filed on patents at issue in Hatch-Waxman litigations compared to seven in 2013. Recently, even hedge funds are utilizing IPR as a tool to attack key drug patents of the pharmaceutical industry to shake up financial markets. Many fear that Judge Randall Rader's "death squad, killing property rights" prediction is becoming a reality....
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