Genentech to Appeal Any Adverse Ruling

Genentech Inc., the world’s No. 2 biotechnology company by sales, said it intends to appeal any unfavorable ruling in a trial over patent-infringement claims made by the University of California.

Lawyers are scheduled to present closing arguments today in the trial, which stems from a 1990 lawsuit. The suit alleges that Genentech’s human growth hormone treatment Protropin was developed using stolen proprietary technology developed at the university and protected by a 1982 patent.

Should South San Francisco-based Genentech, which is majority-owned by Switzerland’s Roche Holding, lose the trial and subsequent appeals, it could be forced to pay damages of up to $1.2 billion. While that’s equal to more than six times Genentech’s 1998 net income of $182 million, investors said it’s too early to worry about such an outcome because it’s impossible to predict the fate of a lawsuit that has been in the courts for nine years.

Genentech has admitted that two scientists stole genetic material from a UC San Francisco laboratory in the late 1970s, but it says the material wasn’t used in the discovery of cloning technology that enabled the company to produce large quantities of human growth hormone.

“Genentech made a decision to take this case to court because the evidence clearly shows that our successful development of human growth hormone is based on independent, proprietary research conducted at Genentech that does not infringe UCSF’s patent,” the company said in a statement issued Wednesday.

The UC Board of Regents is seeking $400 million in lost royalties plus interest, which could be tripled under federal patent law.