How Much Is a CRISPR Patent License Worth?

Last Wednesday, the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) ruled in favor of the Broad Institute in the most monumental biotech patent dispute in decades: a patent "interference" trial over foundational patents covering CRISPR-Cas9, a revolutionary gene-editing technology. A day later—in some truly fortuitous timing—Jorge Contreras of the University of Utah and I published an article in Science examining some of the licensing complexities surrounding research institutions' surrogate companies: for-profit biotech companies with exclusive licenses to the universities' CRISPR technology.