Company: IMCR
Filing Date: 2025-02-26
Form Type: 10-K
Source: 0001671927-25-000006
Chunk: 147

Company: Immunocore Holdings plc
Filing Date: 2025-02-26
Form: 10-K
Item: Item 1A
Chunk 147
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 obtain a license to any patents material to the development of our product candidates. We may not be able to obtain any required license on commercially reasonable terms or at all. Even if we were able to obtain a license, it could be nonexclusive, thereby giving our competitors and other third parties access to the same technologies licensed to us, and it could require us to make substantial licensing and royalty payments. If we are unable to obtain a necessary license to a third-party patent on commercially reasonable terms, we may be unable to commercialize our platform technology or product candidates or such commercialization efforts may be significantly delayed, which could in turn significantly harm our business.

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To counter infringement or unauthorized use, we or our licensing or collaboration partners may be required to file infringement claims. A court may disagree with such allegations, however, and may refuse to stop the other party from using the technology at issue on the grounds that the applicable patents or other intellectual property do not cover the third-party technology in question. Further, such third parties could counterclaim that we infringe, misappropriate or otherwise violate their intellectual property or that a patent or other intellectual property right asserted against them is invalid or unenforceable. In patent litigation in the United States, defendant counterclaims challenging the validity, enforceability or scope of asserted patents are commonplace. Grounds for a validity challenge could be an alleged failure to meet any of several statutory requirements, including lack of novelty, obviousness, non-enablement, written description, or lack of patentable subject matter. Patents may be unenforceable if someone connected with prosecution of the patent withheld relevant information from the USPTO or made a misleading statement during prosecution. It is possible that prior art of which we and the patent examiner were unaware during prosecution exists, which could render any patents that may issue invalid. Moreover, it is also possible that prior art may exist that we are aware of but do not believe is relevant to our future patents, should they issue, but that could nevertheless be determined to render our patents invalid. Third parties may also raise similar validity claims before the USPTO in post-grant proceedings such as ex parte reexaminations, inter partes review or post-grant review, or oppositions or similar proceedings outside the United States, in parallel with litigation or even outside the context of litigation.

An adverse determination in any of the foregoing proceedings could result in the revocation or cancellation of, or amendment to, our patents in such a way that they no longer cover our product candidates or