Corteva Suit on Startup Rival’s Use of Patented Seeds Survives

Corteva Inc.’s allegations that a startup unlawfully exported and modified patented seeds for commercial gain survived a dismissal bid, solidifying a battle about overlapping laws protecting inventor rights and agricultural innovation.

Inari Agriculture Inc. “has identified a tension” between the Patent Act and the Plant Variety Protection Act, but it “paints with too broad a brush,” Judge John Frank Murphy wrote in an opinion issued Aug. 2 and docketed Monday in the US District Court for the District of Delaware. He denied Inari and its Belgian unit’s motion to dismiss and allowed Corteva’s case to proceed.

• Inari, led by ...