Just a few short weeks after winning an FDA Fast Track tag for its investigational BTK degrader in certain blood cancers, BeiGene has been accused of trade secrets theft by its old oncology rival AbbVie.
In a lawsuit filed Friday, lawyers for AbbVie argued that BeiGene “enticed and encouraged” former AbbVie scientist Huaqing Liu, who’s named as a defendant in the case, to jump ship and share proprietary information on AbbVie’s development program for Bruton’s tyrosine kinase (BTK) degrader drugs in hematological cancers.
Compared with traditional BTK inhibitors–such as AbbVie and Johnson & Johnson’s Imbruvica and BeiGene’s Brukinsa–that block part of a protein’s function, protein degraders completely eliminate the protein of interest.
The lawsuit revolves around AbbVie’s BTK degrader candidate ABBV-101, which is in phase 1 testing for B-cell malignancies, and BeiGene’s BGB-16673, which won FDA Fast Track Designation in adults with relapsed or refractory (R/R) chronic lymphocytic leukemia or small lymphocytic lymphoma (CLL/SLL) in late August.
Liu previously worked at AbbVie’s predecessor Abbott Laboratories from 1997 through 2013 and continued to work with AbbVie until his retirement in 2019, according to the lawsuit. From at least September 2018 until September 2019, Liu served as a senior research scientist on AbbVie’s BTK degrader program, the company’s lawyers added. He immediately jumped to BeiGene as an executive director, his LinkedIn page shows.
While Liu was still at AbbVie, BeiGene “identified, targeted, and recruited Liu to leave AbbVie and work in BeiGene’s competing BTK degrader program,” the lawsuit goes on to state, arguing that BeiGene was interested in Liu “for reasons beyond his abilities as a scientist.”
AbbVie’s legal team then contends that its cancer rival enticed and encouraged Liu, in violation of confidentiality agreements, to “steal AbbVie BTK degrader trade secrets and confidential information, to disclose that information to BeiGene, and ultimately to use that information at BeiGene.”
Within half a year of Liu switching companies, BeiGene filed the first in a series of patent applications using and disclosing AbbVie BTK degrader trade secrets, AbbVie argues.
The BTK degraders disclosed in BeiGene’s patent filings “use–and in many respects are identical to–key aspects of the trade secret and confidential designs that AbbVie developed … prior to Liu’s departure,” the Illinois pharma went on to say.
Naturally, BeiGene sees things differently and plans to “vigorously defend” against its rival’s allegations, a company spokesperson told Fierce Biotech.
BeiGene denies AbbVie’s allegations, which it contends were “introduced to hamper the development of BGB-16673”–currently the most advanced BTK degrader in the clinic to date, the spokesperson continued.
He added that BeiGene’s candidate was “independently discovered” and that the company filed patents for BGB-16673 “years before” AbbVie’s initial patent filing for its own BTK degrader.
Abbvie’s litigation “will not interrupt BeiGene’s focus on advancing BGB-16673,” the spokesperson stressed, noting that the company is reviewing AbbVie’s claims and plans to respond through the proper legal channels.
“It is important to note that this litigation will not impact our ability to serve our patients or conduct our operations,” he said.
Should AbbVie’s case go forward, the drugmaker is seeking damages, including those it may incur as a result of BeiGene’s potential sales of BGB-16673, plus exemplary damages tied to the “willful and malicious misappropriation of AbbVie’s trade secret information.”
AbbVie is also seeking the return of its allegedly stolen information and wants to acquire some degree of ownership or interest in the BeiGene patents in question, among other penalties.
Lawsuits around blood cancer drugs are nothing new for AbbVie and BeiGene.
Last summer, AbbVie’s Pharmacyclics unit claimed in a lawsuit that BeiGene’s Brukinsa infringed one of its Imbruvica patents. Both Imbruvica and Brukinsa are irreversible BTK inhibitors approved in CLL or SLL.
In October of last year, the court overseeing the case decided to stay the infringement suit against BeiGene pending resolution of a review of the patent at the center of the lawsuit by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), BeiGene said in a securities filing last year. In May, the USPTO granted BeiGene’s petition and is now expected to issue a final decision on the patent’s validity within a year.