Wall Cardiovascular Technologies LLC agreed to settlements with two of the four major drug-eluting stent makers it’s accused of patent infringement, leaving Abbott (NYSE:ABT) and Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ) subsidiary Cordis Corp. as the remaining defendants.
Wall Cardiovascular sued Boston Scientific Corp. (NYSE:BSX), Medtronic Inc. (NYSE:MDT) and Cordis in 2007, alleging that the companies infringed a patent for "angioplasty stent," naming Boston Scientific’s Taxus stent, Medtronic’s Endeavor stent and the Cordis Cypher as infringing devices (Wall sued Abbott in a separate suit in 2008, alleging infringement of the same patent by Abbott’s Xience V stent).
Medtronic and Boston Scientific each agreed to settle with Wall, with all sides bearing their own legal costs. That leaves Cordis as the sole defendant in the first lawsuit; Abbott, the only defendant in the second lawsuit, also has yet to agree to a settlement.
The lawsuits, filed in the U.S. District Court for Eastern Texas, aren’t the only suits between the companies. Last year a Delaware judge tossed a counter-suit filed by Boston Scientific against Wall and its half-owner, Cardio Holdings LLC. Judge Susan Robinson of the U.S. District Court for Delaware ruled that her court lacked jurisdiction over the matter. BoSci had moved to have the court rule for non-infringement, invalidity and unenforceability of the patent in the suit filed against it by Wall — and filed suit on the same grounds in the Delaware court. Robinson, finding that the links to Delaware are tenuous and that the same issues are being argued in the Texas case, granted Wall Cardiovascular’s motion to dismiss.