Moderna Again Fails to Shift Most Covid-Shot Patent Costs to US

A federal judge rejected Moderna Inc.’s bid to shift most patent liability for its Covid-19 vaccine to the US government, keeping Arbutus Biopharma Corp.’s high-stakes infringement case over the Spikevax shot on track for a March jury trial in Delaware.

Moderna failed to show that the bulk of its vaccine production was made “for the Government,” Judge Joshua D. Wolson wrote in an opinion issued Monday in the US District Court for the District of Delaware. He allowed a narrow carve-out from patent liability for doses supplied directly to the US and trimmed some infringement theories.

The clash is a ...