NEW YORK – Oxford Nanopore Technologies on Thursday filed a lawsuit against BGI Group and its affiliates for "breach of contract, misuse of confidential information, and infringement of trade secrets" in the Business and Property Courts of the High Court of England and Wales in the UK.
BGI Shenzhen (commonly known as BGI Group), Beijing Tech Solutions, Wuhan BGI Clinical Laboratory, BGI Research, MGI Holdings, and MGI Tech were named in the lawsuit.
In the complaint, obtained by GenomeWeb, Oxford Nanopore alleges that BGI and its affiliates "impermissibly used" the company's technology to develop a competing product, the Cyclone Seq sequencer, as well as its associated flow cells and consumables.
Oxford Nanopore claimed it has only granted BGI access to its technology "under the restrictions and limitations provided by various agreements," which include restrictions on using Oxford Nanopore's technology in the development of a competing product.
Additionally, Oxford Nanopore claims that BGI and affiliates have "misled" and "repeatedly provided express assurances" to Oxford Nanopore that they "had no interest in producing competing nanopore sequencing technology."
In filing the complaint, Oxford Nanopore asked the court to grant an injunction to restrain BGI and affiliates from the alleged misuse of confidential information and from infringing the trade secrets, among other requests.
Oxford Nanopore also asked the court to grant an injunction to restrain BGI and affiliates from selling, licensing, or using or permitted use of the Cyclone Seq or any other sequencer embodying materially the same sequencing technology.
Oxford Nanopore had indicated the planned lawsuit in September, filing an ex parte application in the US District Court for the Northern District of California to serve subpoenas on Complete Genomics, Innomics (formerly known as BGI Americas), MGI Americas, and other entities.
The company subsequently withdrew the application in November.
Oxford Nanopore declined to comment on the lawsuit. BGI and MGI representatives also declined to comment.