Company: CNTB
Filing Date: 2025-03-31
Form Type: 10-K
Source: 0001835268-25-000014
Chunk: 166

Company: Connect Biopharma Holdings Ltd
Filing Date: 2025-03-31
Form: 10-K
Item: Item 1A
Chunk 166
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 established companies are also pursuing strategies to license or acquire third-party intellectual property rights that we may consider attractive. These established companies may have a competitive advantage over us due to their size, cash resources and greater clinical development and commercialization capabilities. In addition, companies that perceive us to be a competitor may be unwilling to assign or license rights to us. We also may be unable to license or acquire third-party intellectual property rights on terms that would allow us to make an appropriate return on our investment. If we are unable to successfully obtain rights to required third-party intellectual property rights or maintain the existing intellectual property rights we have, we may have to abandon development of the applicable program and/or develop alternative approaches that do not infringe, misappropriate or otherwise violate such intellectual property rights. This could entail additional costs and development delays, and the development of such alternatives may not be feasible. Any of the foregoing could prevent us from developing or commercializing one or more of our Product Candidates, force us to modify such Product Candidates, or cease some aspect of our business operations, and our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects could suffer.

We may become involved in lawsuits to protect or enforce our patents or other intellectual property rights, which could be expensive, time-consuming and unsuccessful.

Competitors may infringe, misappropriate or otherwise violate our or our future licensors’ patents or other intellectual property rights. To counter infringement or unauthorized use, we may be required to file legal claims, which can be expensive and time-consuming. In addition, in such a proceeding, a court may decide that an asserted patent is not valid or is unenforceable, or may refuse to stop the other party from using the technology at issue on the grounds that the asserted patent or other intellectual property right does not cover the third-party technology in question. An adverse result in any litigation or defense proceedings could put one or more asserted patents at risk of being invalidated or interpreted narrowly and could put related patent applications at risk of not issuing. The initiation of a claim against a third party may also cause the third party to bring counter claims against us, such as claims asserting that our patents are invalid or unenforceable. In patent litigation in the U.S., the PRC and elsewhere, 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 or lack of statutory subject matter. Grounds for an unenforce