(Reuters) -German drugmaker CureVac and GSK reached an agreement with BioNTech and Pfizer on Thursday to resolve a years-long patent dispute related to mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccines, CureVac said.
As part of the settlement, CureVac and GSK will receive a combined payment of $740 million and single-digit royalties on sales of COVID-19 vaccines in the U.S. going forward.
CureVac will also grant BioNTech and Pfizer a non-exclusive license to manufacture, use, import and sell mRNA-based COVID-19 and influenza products in the U.S.
The settlement comes after BioNTech agreed to acquire its domestic peer CureVac in a $1.25 billion all-stock deal in June.
Three years ago, CureVac had filed a patent lawsuit against BioNTech over its use of mRNA technology, seeking fair compensation from the company and two of its subsidiaries for infringement of its intellectual property rights.
CureVac had said that its claim to intellectual property rights was based on more than two decades of work on mRNA technology, some of which was used by BioNTech and Pfizer for the development and sale of their Comirnaty coronavirus vaccine.
CureVac’s efforts to develop an mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccine did not come to fruition during the pandemic, whereas BioNTech and its partner Pfizer chalked up more than $40 billion in combined vaccine sales in 2021 and 2022.
(Reporting by Shivani Tanna, Angela Christy, Mrinmay Dey in Bengaluru; Editing by Alan Barona and Rashmi Aich)
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