Annual report pursuant to Section 13 and 15(d)

License Agreements

v3.20.4
License Agreements
12 Months Ended
Dec. 31, 2020
License Agreements  
License Agreements

9. License Agreements

 

NIH License

 

Through Noachis Terra Inc., the Company is a party to a Patent License and Biological Materials License Agreement (the “License Agreement” or “NIH License”), dated March 23, 2020, with the United States Department of Health and Human Services (the “HHS”), as represented by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (“NIAID”), an Institute within the National Institutes of Health (“NIH”). Under the terms of the License Agreement, the Company holds a nonexclusive, worldwide license to certain specified patent rights (including patent applications, provisional patent applications and Patent Cooperation Treaty (“PCT”) patent applications) and biological materials relating to the use of pre-fusion coronavirus spike proteins to exploit products (“Licensed Products”) and practice processes (“Licensed Processes”) that are covered by the licensed patent rights and biological materials for the purpose of developing and commercializing a vaccine product candidate for SARS-CoV-2.

 

The License Agreement will expire upon (a) twenty (20) years from the first commercial sale where no licensed patent rights exist or have ceased to exist or (b) the expiration of the last patent contained in the licensed patent rights, unless terminated earlier. None of the applications included in the NIH licensed patent rights have issued yet. The NIH may terminate or modify the license in the event of a material breach, including if the Company does not meet certain milestones by certain dates, or upon certain insolvency events that remain uncured following the date that is 90 days following written notice of such breach or insolvency event. The Company may terminate the license, or any portion thereof, at its sole discretion at any time upon 60 days written notice to the NIH.

 

Exclusive Channel Collaboration Agreement (“Lantibiotic ECC”):

 

On June 5, 2012, the Company entered into the Lantibiotic ECC with Precigen, Inc., ILH Holdings, Inc. (n/k/a Eleszto Genetika, Inc. (“EGI”)) that governs a “channel collaboration” arrangement in which the Company will use EGI’s advanced transgene and cell engineering platforms for the development and production of lantibiotics, a class of peptide antibiotics that are naturally produced in Gram-positive bacteria and contain the characteristic polycyclic thioether amino acids lanthionine and methyllanthonine (collectively, the “Lantibiotics Program”). The Lantibiotic ECC grants the Company an exclusive worldwide license to use patents and other intellectual property of EGI in connection with the research, development, use, importing, exporting, manufacture, sale, and offer for sale of drug products involving the direct administration to humans or companion animals of a lantibiotic for the prevention or treatment of infectious disease (“Oragenics Products”). Such license is exclusive with respect to any clinical development, selling, offering for sale or other commercialization of Oragenics Products, and otherwise is non-exclusive. Subject to limited exceptions, the Company may not sublicense the rights described without EGI’s written consent. The Lantibiotic ECC establishes committees comprised of Company and EGI representatives that will govern activities related to the Lantibiotics Program in the areas of project establishment, chemistry, manufacturing and controls matters, clinical and regulatory matters, commercialization efforts and intellectual property matters. The Company has agreed to indemnify and hold EGI harmless from any damages caused as a result of (i) our negligence or willful misconduct, (ii) the use, handling, storage, or transport of EGI Materials (as defined in the Lantibiotic ECC), (iii) our breach of a material representation, warranty or covenant in the Lantibiotic ECC, or (iv) the design, development, manufacture, regulatory approval, handling, storage, transport, distribution, sale or other disposition of any Oragenics Product.

 

EGI may terminate the Lantibiotic ECC if we fail to use diligent efforts to develop and commercialize Oragenics Products or if we elect not to pursue the development of a Lantibiotics Program identified by EGI that is a “Superior Therapy” as defined in the Lantibiotic ECC. We may voluntarily terminate the Lantibiotic ECC at any time upon 90 days written notice to EGI. Upon termination of the Lantibiotic ECC, the Company may continue to develop and commercialize any Oragenics Product that has been, at the time of termination:

 

  commercialized by the Company;

 

  approved by regulatory authorities;

 

  a subject of an application for regulatory approval that is pending before the applicable regulatory authority; or

 

  the subject of at least an ongoing Phase 1, Phase 2 or Phase 3 clinical trial in the Field (in the case of a termination by EGI due to an uncured material breach by the Company or a voluntary termination by the Company).

 

The Company has ongoing obligations and commitments with respect to its License Agreements. See Note 12 — Commitments and Contingencies.