Industrial &

Agricultural Biotech

Food security and sustainability of resources are concerns that are rarely far from the headlines. While solutions to these challenges must be multi-disciplinary, industrial and agricultural biotechnology has already been used to transform efficiency across a wide variety of industrial process and offers huge potential to do more.

Industrial enzymes are used in myriad industrial processes, with novel enzymes and novel applications continuing to be found. Our IP experts have a long history of involvement in protein engineering and industrial enzyme technology, including extensive offensive and defensive opposition work at the European Patent Office. The team also has particular experience in industrial microbiology, biofuel production and biosourced polymers, working alongside our chemists.

Gene editing technologies such as CRISPR are beginning to radically alter the field of functional genomics and the engineering of industrial microbes and crops.  We are proud to have been at the forefront of developments in this area, having worked with innovators of the CRISP-Cas9 technology, as well as those using it to develop new commercial products.

In the area of plant bioscience, the political interest in food production has introduced regulatory and legal complexities. Our specialised and expert plant bioscience team understand the toolkit of approaches which can be used to protect innovation in this area and the need for a flexible approach which can adapt to the shifting landscape. As well as patents and trade marks, we can offer advice and assistance in obtaining Plant Variety Rights (PVRs) and National Listings in both the UK and Europe.

Read more about protecting your innovations

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Enzyme engineering & industrial fermentation

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Future & functional foods

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Microbiome

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Special Report

Opposition Trends in the Life Sciences Sector

We published this report to help tackle the key questions our clients ask regularly. In spring 2019, we undertook 350 hours of research, analysing more than 5,000 opposition cases filed at the European Patent Office over the last ten years, studying the timelines for hundreds of oppositions both before and after the EPO’s opposition streamlining initiative.

View the 2020 addendum for this report, based on information as it appeared on the EPO Register on 10 January 2021 and from bulk data sets extracted on this date.

Read our latest blogs

UPC Weekly - UPC dials up the advantages for patentees

UPC Weekly - UPC dials up the advantages for patentees

by Matthew Naylor

2024 Week 46 We report this week on two new UPC decisions that make the UPC an even more attractive choice for patent holders seeking to enforce their European patents. The headlines are that: (i) ...

Cambiotics: a novel treatment for PFAS ‘forever chemicals’

Cambiotics: a novel treatment for PFAS ‘forever chemicals’

by Eliot Ward

PFAS are toxic pollutants causing health problems globally. There is currently no treatment. Now a Danish startup is producing a probiotic, which it claims, flushes out the toxins via natural ...

UPC Weekly - NJOY duel with Juul

UPC Weekly - NJOY duel with Juul

by Matthew Naylor

2024 Week 45 5 November 2024 saw two decisions handed down by the UPC Paris Central Division (CD) in revocation actions filed by NJOY against two related Juul patents. In the first decision, against ...

We work at every stage of the IP lifecycle

Protect

Drafting, Filing & Prosecution
Portfolio Management
Searching & Watching
Renewals & EP Validations

Defend

Pre-action Advice
Oppositions & Appeals
Litigation
Alternative Dispute Resolution

Exploit

Strategic Advice
Commercial Issues
Transactions
Corporate Support

Forward Magazines Overlapping 8

Mewburn Ellis

FORWARD MAGAZINE

Mewburn Ellis Forward is a biannual publication that celebrates the best of innovation and exploration. Through its pages we hope to inform and entertain, but also to encourage discussion about the most compelling developments taking place in the scientific and entrepreneurial world. Along the way, we’ll engage with the IP challenges that international organisations face every day.