Medtronic has settled a 3-year-old patent dispute it filed against AGA Medical related to the so-called Jervis patents. As part of the settlement, AGA will make payments to Medtronic totaling $35 million over a four-year period, with the final portion due in January 2014.
The settlement covers all existing products, as well as any new products developed and commercialized by AGA. Medtronic will grant a non-exclusive license to AGA to use the Jervis patent family.
Patents in the Jervis patent family, the last of which is set to expire in 2018, cover the use of stress to restrain certain self-expanding medical devices made of nitinol, a shape-memory metal alloy frequently used in a number of applications, including Medtronic's transcatheter coronary heart valve program.
"We are pleased to have reached this agreement, which eliminates much of the expense and uncertainty associated with the litigation and enables the company to focus its resources and attention on providing patients with innovative devices to treat significant medical conditions," AGA President and CEO John Barr says in a statement.
- check out Medtronic's statement
- see AGA's release