Dr. Michelle Rhyu

Cooley successfully defeated an emergency motion for injunction for Samsung in Alexion Pharmaceuticals, Inc. et al. v. Samsung Bioepis Co. Ltd. before District Judge Gregory Williams in ongoing Biologics Price Competition and Innovation Act (BPCIA) litigation for its proposed biosimilar Soliris, which is used to treat blood disorders.

Cooley represented Sight Sciences (listed as SGHT on Nasdaq), an eyecare technology company focused on developing and commercializing innovative, interventional technologies that elevate the standard of care, which received a jury trial win on April 26, 2024, against its competitors – Alcon, Alcon Vision and Alcon Research (collectively known as Alcon) and Ivantis – in the US District Court for the District of Delaware.

Few patent cases make it all the way to the Supreme Court. Even fewer involve a dispute in which a company's very survival is at stake. Since 2011, our client Gevo, a pioneer in the biofuels industry, and Butamax, a joint venture of giants BP and DuPont, had been trading blows, filing close to a dozen patent suits against each other. Butamax initially brought suit in the District of Delaware in an attempt to knock Gevo out of the emerging market for isobutanol alternative energy. In that case, the court granted summary judgment of noninfringement in favor of Gevo, prompting Butamax to appeal. On appeal, the Federal Circuit rejected the district court's claim construction and issued a new claim construction that vacated the noninfringement ruling.

In response, Cooley took the case to the US Supreme Court and, in January 2015, the high court granted our petition for writ of certiorari, vacating the judgment against Gevo and remanding the case back to the Federal Circuit for further consideration. This decision, and numerous other victories including key summary judgment victories, paved the path for Gevo to reach a favorable global patent cross-license and settlement agreement with Butamax. The agreement forms a partnership between the two biofuel companies aimed at leveraging one another's technology.

Cooley, along with the ACLU, Brancart & Brancart and the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, has filed a lawsuit against the city of Escondido, California charging that it employed zoning and land use pretexts to discriminate against vulnerable children fleeing violence and persecution in Central America. The lawsuit, brought on behalf of Southwest Key, alleges violations of federal and state fair housing laws and the United States Constitution.

As required by law, the federal government contracts with organizations such as Southwest Key to provide housing for children fleeing violence and persecution. Many of the children ultimately qualify for asylum or legal status, allowing them to remain in the United States.

In February 2014, Southwest Key approached the city of Escondido about potential locations to house unaccompanied children awaiting placement with parents, relatives or other caregivers while their immigration cases are pending. When Southwest Key first approached the city, it sought to convert a motel site located in a commercial zone into housing for the unaccompanied children. However, the city's staff rejected that proposal claiming it was not allowed despite the fact that the municipal code permitted "residential care facilities" in the subject commercial zone. Attempting to work with the city, Southwest Key agreed to suspend an appeal from that decision and to pursue a conditional use permit to convert a former skilled nursing facility located in a residential zone in another part of the city.

In June 2014, before the city's Planning Commission held its hearing on the conditional use permit for the nursing home, Escondido Mayor Sam Abed publicly opposed the project, claiming it was a "federal" issue he did not want in Escondido. The Planning Commission then unanimously rejected the proposal.

The City Council held a hearing on Southwest Key's appeal in October 2014. Opposing the appeal, members of the public stated, "We don't want these people in our neighborhood," and reminded the City Council, "You are sitting up there right now because the majority of the people wanted you there, not the minority. Speak for the majority." The City Council voted 4-1 to deny Southwest Key's appeal.

Joseph Rich, co-director of the Fair Housing and Community Development Project at the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, said: "Such statements have been found by many courts to be coded language for racial and national origin animus and to support findings of discrimination that violate the Fair Housing Act and other civil rights laws."

When F. Hoffmann-La Roche sought to strip Gilead of its rights to a blockbuster drug, Gilead turned to Cooley. At stake were Gilead's exclusive rights to sofosbuvir (Sovaldi), approved by the FDA in 2013 as a breakthrough drug for the treatment of hepatitis C. Within the first six months of going to market, Sovaldi earned nearly $6 billion in sales, making it one of the most successful drug launches in history.

Roche alleged exclusive rights based on an earlier collaboration agreement. Cooley presented this "bet the company" case before a panel of three arbitrators during a two-week arbitration hearing. In August 2014, the arbitration panel issued its award, ruling in favor of Gilead and finding that Roche failed to establish any of its contract or patent-based claims to sofosbuvir. This was a huge win for Gilead, with Sovaldi generating billions of dollars in revenue each year.

The Financial Times, The American Lawyer and its sister publications The Recorder and National Law Journal all profiled the victory when announcing Cooley as the winner of multiple litigation awards, including AmLaw's recent selection of the case as "Global Dispute of the Year: Commercial Arbitration."