IPAB sets aside patent office order refusing crystalline form patent of Vorapaxar

Ever filed a patent application and have a rejection issued without any explanations? With the recent IPAB order, hopefully we won’t be having more of that anymore. In this case the patentee/appellant (Plough Schering now Merck) had filed a patent application claiming a particular crystalline form of a thrombin receptor antagonist, Vorapaxar. In 2009, the patent office passed an order rejecting the patent application under Section 15 citing lack of inventive step and lack of proof regarding therapeutic efficacy of the...