Illumina and Powell Gilbert in love with Lisbon

The dispute between Illumina and Element Biosciences has been brewing for several months. Back in 2025, the two companies filed lawsuits against each other over their DNA sequencing instruments at US courts and the Regional Court Munich. In December, Illumina then sued its competitor at the Unified Patent Court. The lawsuit became public this week.

At the local division Lisbon under presiding judge Rute Lopes, Illumina accuses its competitor of infringing its EP 3 714 978 with its DNA sequencing instruments. The patent received unitary effect from the European Patent Office on 10 December. Illumina filed the lawsuit immediately afterwards.

Presiding judge Lopez, Stefan Johansson from Sweden and Stefan Schilling from Hamburg will hear the suit (case ID: UPC_CFI_0001920/2025).

USA, Germany and the UPC

Illumina leads the DNA sequencing market. California-based start-up Element Biosciences, entered the market in spring 2025 with its new product AVITI.

Shortly after the product launch, Illumina filed lawsuits at the District Court of Delaware based on five US patents (case ID: 1:25-cv-00602). The US patents are No. 12,251,702, No. 8,951,781, No. 11,117,130, No. 11,697,116 and No. 12,151,241.

In September 2025, Element Biosciences retaliated in the US and Germany. The US infringement cases at the District Court of Delaware concern four US patents: Nos. 8 612 161, 9 605 301, 9 909 174 and 11 001 887 (case ID: 1:25-cv-01175).

Element also filed an antitrust lawsuit at the District Court for the Northern District of California. It alleges that Illumina conducted an unlawful campaign to maintain its monopoly in short-read next-generation sequencing instruments, consumables and services (case ID: 5:2025cv08026).

Element’s infringement case at the Regional Court Munich concerns German patent DE 112008000363. Further details about the German case are not currently available.

Third case for the LD Lisbon

The Lisbon local division remains one of the smaller divisions in the UPC system. To date, it has handled the dispute between Ericsson and Asus and Boehringer Ingelheim vs Zentiva, which entailed two infringement and two PI cases. The court rejected a PI in both disputes. The main proceedings between Boehringer Ingelheim and Zentiva continue.

Illumina’s lawsuit gives the local division another active case in the life sciences sector.

UK law firm Powell Gilbert is no stranger to Lisbon, having successfully defended Asus against Ericsson’s claim. Partners Bethan Hopewell, Joel Coles and Peter FitzPatrick, with support from Ellis King, lead and coordinate the case. Sara Nazaré from the Lisbon law firm NLP serves as local counsel. Both firms previously collaborated on the UPC case for Asus.

Powell Gilbert regularly advises Illumina in Europe. Hopewell and Coles previously represented Illumina in a dispute with MGI at the UK High Court.

Element Biosciences has engaged Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan for its UPC defence, with Marcus Grosch as lead partner. Thehe US litigation firm is also involved in the US proceedings. JUVE Patent does not know whether Grosch also advises Element in the related case at the Regional Court Munich.

Illumina’s counsel for the German case remains unknown.