Company: CERO
Filing Date: 2025-04-15
Form Type: 10-K
Source: 0001213900-25-032134
Chunk: 233

Company: CERO THERAPEUTICS HOLDINGS, INC.
Filing Date: 2025-04-15
Form: 10-K
Item: Item 1
Chunk 233
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 third-party contractors and consultants to publish data potentially relating
to our trade secrets, although our agreements may contain certain limited publication rights. For example, any academic institution that
we may collaborate with will likely expect to be granted rights to publish data arising out of such collaboration and any joint R&D
programs may require us to share trade secrets under the terms of our R&D or similar agreements. Despite our efforts to protect our
trade secrets, our competitors may discover our trade secrets, either through breach of our agreements with third parties, independent
development or publication of information by any of our third-party collaborators. A competitor’s discovery of our trade secrets
would impair our competitive position and have an adverse impact on our business.

We may not have sufficient patent lifespan
to effectively protect our products and business.

All of our patents are in
early stages. Patents have a limited lifespan. In the United States, the natural expiration of a patent is generally 20 years after its
earliest U.S. non-provisional filing date. Given the amount of time required for the development, testing and regulatory review of new
product candidates, patents protecting such candidates might expire before or shortly after the resulting products are commercialized.
As a result, our patents may not provide us with sufficient rights to exclude others from commercializing products similar or identical
to ours. We expect to seek extensions of patent terms for our issued patents, where available. This includes in the United States under
the Hatch-Waxman Act, which permits a patent term extension of up to five years beyond the original expiration date of the patent as compensation
for regulatory delays. However, such a patent term extension cannot lengthen the remaining term of a patent beyond a total of 14 years
from the product’s approval date. Only one patent applicable to an approved drug is eligible for the extension and the application
for the extension must be submitted prior to the expiration of the patent. During the period of patent term extension, the claims of a
patent are not enforceable for their full scope but are instead limited to the scope of the approved product. In addition, the applicable
authorities, including the FDA in the United States, and any comparable foreign regulatory authorities, may not agree with our assessment
of whether such extensions are available, and may refuse to grant extensions to our patents, or may grant more limited extensions than
we request. In addition, we may not be granted an extension because of, for example, failing to apply within applicable deadlines, failing
to apply