A Bayer spokesperson reported that Bayer’s Monsanto filed a lawsuit against COVID-19 vaccine makers Pfizer, BioNTech, and Moderna in Delaware federal court on Tuesday for allegedly misusing its messenger RNA technology in manufacturing their vaccines.
The patent infringement cases alleged that the companies imitated technology invented by Monsanto in the 1980s to enhance mRNA in crops so as to stabilize the genetic material in their vaccines.
Bayer separately brought a closely parallel claim against Johnson & Johnson in federal court in New Jersey on Tuesday, claiming that a DNA-based process J&J employed in the production of its shots violated the patent.
A spokesperson at Moderna informed that the company is aware of the legal action and will defend itself. Spokespeople for Pfizer, BioNTech, and Johnson & Johnson did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The issues raised by Bayers are part of a tangle of patent cases surrounding the blockbuster COVID vaccines, including a current suit filed by Moderna against Pfizer in 2022.
Bayer did not contribute to the development of COVID vaccines and does not manufacture or market any type of it. It petitioned the courts to grant them monetary damages not mentioned and claimed that it was not seeking to prevent the companies from producing their vaccines.
According to company reports, a fraction of their sales at the height of the pandemic, Pfizer and BioNTech collected over $3.3 billion dollars in revenue through sales of their vaccine Comirnaty worldwide in 2024, and Moderna got $3.2 billion dollars through their vaccine Spikevax.
However, Johnson & Johnson withdrew its COVID vaccine from sale in the United States in 2023. The lawsuits filed by Bayer alleged that Monsanto scientists had developed a technology in the 1980s that reduced mRNA instability to produce more pest-resistant crops.
Thus, Bayer had asserted that Pfizer and Moderna had used technology to enhance the stability of mRNA, which breaches one of its patents.
