By Donald Zuhn —

On December 21, 2007, Illumina, Inc. announced that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office had ordered the reexamination of U.S. Patent Nos. 6,355,432; 6,646,243; 5,545,531; and 5,795,716.  The patents ordered into reexamination constitute four of the five patents that Affymetrix, Inc. asserted against Illumina in an infringement action filed on July 26, 2004 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware.  Illumina indicated in its statements regarding the reexaminations that it has also filed a request for reexamination of the fifth patent (U.S. Patent No. 6,399,365) asserted by Affymetrix.

The USPTO has assigned reexamination serial nos. 90/008,885; 90/008,889; 90/008,888; and 90/008,886 to the reexaminations of the ‘432, ‘243, ‘531, and ‘716 patents, respectively.  All four of the reexaminations were ordered following requests for ex parte reexamination filed by Illumina on October 19, 2007.

For additional information regarding this topic, please see:

• Illumina press release concerning the ‘432 and ‘243 patents
• Illumina press release concerning the ‘531 and ‘716 patents