Oro Valley-based medical-lab instrument maker Ventana Medical Systems Inc. has settled patent litigation with rival BioGenex Laboratories Inc. over tissue slides and chemical agents used in testing, BioGenex said Friday.
Under the agreement, BioGenex is licensed to use Ventana patents methods to bar-code slides and reagents, and Ventana is licensed to use BioGenex's patent for antigen retrieval and methods in preparing samples, BioGenex, based in San Ramon, Calif., said in a statement. Financial details weren't released.
Both companies also agreed to cooperate in defending the cross-licensed patents.
The settlement ends lawsuits pending in federal courts in Arizona and California, and one before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington. The cases involved four patents owned by BioGenex and one by Ventana.
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"This cross license with Ventana will help us both ensure that our respective patents are widely used by the industry under license agreements," Krishan Kalra, chief executive officer of closely held BioGenex, said in a statement.
"This is a very good settlement for Ventana," Ventana CEO Christopher Gleeson said.
Shares of Ventana, which rose 19 percent this year, fell 19 cents to $51.27 in Nasdaq Stock Market composite trading.
Ventana, which employs about 600 people at its Oro Valley headquarters and manufacturing complex, makes automated systems that prepare microscope slides used in tissue analysis for diagnostics and research.
Ventana has been involved in several patent lawsuits over the past several years, as both plaintiff and defendant.
In early May, Ventana said a federal court in Delaware had denied a preliminary injunction sought by Digene Corp. in the company's lawsuit against Ventana involving a test for human papillomavirus, or HPV. That lawsuit is still pending.