Company: OCEA
Filing Date: 2025-04-08
Form Type: 10-K
Source: 0001641172-25-003155
Chunk: 2632

Company: Ocean Biomedical, Inc.
Filing Date: 2025-04-08
Form: 10-K
Item: Item 1
Chunk 2632
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 our current patents, we may lose the right to exclude others from practicing these inventions.
The expiration of these patents could also have a similar material adverse effect on our business, results of operations, financial condition
and prospects. We also have rights to pending patent applications covering our proprietary technologies or our product candidates, but
we cannot be assured that the USPTO or relevant foreign patent offices will grant any of these patent applications.

Changes
in patent law in the U.S. and in foreign jurisdictions could diminish the value of patents in general, thereby impairing our ability
to protect our products.

103

Changes
in either the patent laws or interpretation of the patent laws in the United States could increase the uncertainties and costs surrounding
the prosecution of patent applications and the enforcement or defense of issued patents. Assuming that other requirements for patentability
are met, prior to March 16, 2013, in the United States, the first to invent the claimed invention was entitled to the patent, while outside
the United States, the first to file a patent application was entitled to the patent. On March 16, 2013, under the Leahy-Smith America
Invents Act, or the America Invents Act, enacted in September 2011, the United States transitioned to a first inventor to file system
in which, assuming that other requirements for patentability are met, the first inventor to file a patent application will be entitled
to the patent on an invention regardless of whether a third party was the first to invent the claimed invention. A third party that files
a patent application in the USPTO on or after March 16, 2013, but before us could therefore be awarded a patent covering an invention
of ours even if we had made the invention before it was made by such third party. This will require us to be cognizant of the time from
invention to filing of a patent application. Since patent applications in the United States and most other countries are confidential
for a period of time after filing or until issuance, we cannot be certain that we or our licensors were the first to either (i) file
any patent application related to our product candidates or (ii) invent any of the inventions claimed in our or our licensor’s
patents or patent applications.

The
America Invents Act also includes a number of significant changes that affect the way patent applications will be prosecuted and also
may affect patent litigation. These include allowing third party submission of prior art to the USPTO during