This story has been updated from a previous version to include a statement from Bruker.
NEW YORK – The US District Court for the District of Delaware today granted 10x Genomics a permanent injunction in its patent infringement suit against NanoString Technologies (now a part of Bruker's spatial biology group).
The injunction bars the manufacture, use, and sale of GeoMx products in the US, though it allows NanoString customers who have installed the GeoMX platform in their labs before Nov. 18, 2023, "to finish their research and continue to purchase consumables from NanoString subject to a royalty rate," the court said.
The court also granted 10x's motion for supplemental damages and pre-judgment interest but denied its request for enhanced damages and attorneys' fees.
Last year, a Delaware jury found that NanoString's GeoMx Digital Spatial Profiler infringed seven patents held by 10x, exclusively licensed from Prognosys Biosciences. The jury awarded 10x over $31 million in damages and found the infringement to be willful.
Following that decision, NanoString moved for judgment as a matter of law, asking the court to overturn the jury's decision, or, alternatively, to provide a new trial. 10x, meanwhile, moved for a permanent injunction, enhanced damages, and prejudgment interest.
The court denied NanoString's motion, asserting that while the company "argues the jury lacked substantial evidence to make" its finding, it "fails to meaningfully engage with all the evidence presented at trial or acknowledge the appropriate function of the jury in weighing the evidence presented at trial."
Following the jury's verdict last year, NanoString filed for bankruptcy and was subsequently acquired by Bruker for approximately $392.6 million in cash.
In a statement, Bruker said that the latest ruling does not impact the CosMx or nCounter product lines, which Bruker also acquired along with NanoString. The company also said that GeoMx instrument revenue represent less than 0.2 percent of Bruker's total revenue.
"We respectfully disagree with the District Court's decision to grant an injunction with respect to sales of GeoMx products to new customers in the United States and we expect to promptly seek a stay of any injunction that is finally ordered," Todd Garland, president Bruker's spatial biology division, said in a statement. "We also look forward to the appeal of our case being heard by the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, a court that specializes in patent disputes. We remain steadfast in our view that the patents that were licensed by 10x and asserted against us are invalid and describe a fundamentally different method than what is used by the GeoMx system. We strongly believe that we should be vindicated on appeal."
Bruker's NanoString business has had better luck in its patent disputes with 10x in European courts. In October, the European Unified Patent Court (UPC) ruled in favor of Bruker, invalidating 10x's European Patent No. 2794928B1. That ruling followed a May 2024 decision by the German Federal Patent Court that also declared the 928 patent invalid. With the UPC decision, the 928 patent was also declared invalid in France and the Netherlands.
In Monday morning trade in the Nasdaq, shares of 10x Genomics were up around 4 percent at $14.55 while shares of Bruker were down a fraction of a percent at $56.76.