This case is focused on polymorphs, namely what are the standards for novelty and inventiveness when it comes to new crystal forms of a known drug? A recent Supreme People’s Court decision in China is illustrative of the way Chinese courts are thinking about polymorph patents in China. Grünenthal is a German pharmaceutical company and inventor of the opioid painkiller Pentadol[1]. Grünenthal has a Chinese patent (ZL 200580021661.1) with claims directed towards a new crystalline form of particular phenol hydrochloride (“tapentastat hydrochloride” and “Form A” in claim 1), processes for preparing tapentastat hydrochloride (claim 3), and processes for preparing Form A (claims 16 and 23). Form A is made by…
