Anthony M. Insogna

Insogna appreciates that to be a successful intellectual property lawyer, it helps to have a strong interest in other industries as well.

Insogna, now the co-leader of Jones Day’s global IP practice, said he originally thought he was going to be a dentist or doctor. Soon, however, he didn’t feel like he was a typical pre-med student.

“Along the way I met a grad student who was switching from the lab to the law,” Insogna remembered. “He said to me that if you love science and you want to be involved in business, then patent law was something you should look at.”

Insonga has gone on to become a consummate expert in patent litigation, Hatch Waxman advice, due diligence and patent portfolio management for life sciences companies.

In the last year, Insogna and his Jones Day team were instrumental in what he refers to as “a fun, complex and voluminous project” — the ongoing, $74 billion acquisition by Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. of Celgene Corp., a worldwide hematology and oncology company whom Insogna has represented since 1996. The deal is scheduled to close later this year.

Specifically, Insogna and his team successfully blocked institution of four inter partes review petitions seeking review of patents covering uses of Celgene’s Revlimid(r) drug, including three petitions directed to patents claiming the treatment of myelopdysplastic syndrome in February decisions.

Insogna works with Celgene, Merck & Co., AbbVie and similar companies in various, versatile capacities.

“Our team benefits from being on both sides,” Insogna said. “In the life sciences area, we’re probably more for the patent owner than for the petitioner. [But] being on the patent owner side and exploiting the errors that others have done makes us a better petitioner.”

Notably, Insogna worked with AbbVie on challenges to the biopharma’s antibody therapeutic Humira, touted as the top-selling drug in the world, for specific technology, and won them all in September 2017 and February 2018. The Patent Trial and Appeal Board also denied institution of each of the five IPR petitions with regard to all of the challenged claims.

This totaled nine victories for Insogna and his team. “We had a combination of luck and smarts to win those,” he said.

The common thread, says Insogna, is that his clients are innovators in developing products to improve the public’s health, and he wants to be a part of that.

“In the U.S., to get a drug approved takes 10 years and over a billion dollars, so no one really would make that investment in getting a new medicine unless they had exclusivity,” Insogna reasoned.

“So I feel like guiding them with patents and protecting their patent portfolio in order to help them recoup their investment, or be willing to make the investment, is a valuable contribution in helping the medicines actually get to the public,” he added.

— Dan Heching