Hi Gary. Marry Christmas and love you man, but you can really misread things.
I did not really mean "give" it away, I mean allowing anyone else to have it and characterized it as giving away because beyond having their own factories, that would be what it would be. Doesn't matter if it's leased or sold or licensed. Once out of the bag, it's out of the bag.
Patents on machinery like that are useless in this day and age, in terms of stopping competition. I have given you examples but they seem not to be registering. Whether someone patents a computer, or a Xerox machine, someone will always find an open source, simple way to backwards engineer it once they have a copy of it. Never fails. Patents do not stop that. You want to license to a Chinese company no less, and that is the fastest way to losing your IP known in the modern world. Stealing IP is how much of Chinese industry was created. Unfortunate, but well known to be true.
The patent is on making the drug. If you believe that City of Hope has created DCVax-L, in their clean room, you've just provided an argument against your argument that patents protect anything. However, I seriously doubt they have, and when you give away a recipe, you're no longer a drug company. A lot of what you say on this topic indicates a naive understanding of the purpose of drug regulation, how it works or why it is what it is or how drug companies make their money. I know that you do know but your points often contradict that knowledge or other points so I think some core idea or concept is being lost here in the conversation. As for doctors who think they've done things they almost certainly haven't, or brag that they have, they probably haven't done it. I'd take fish tales with a grain of salt. That is not to dismiss that good doctors give great care or that patients have not benefitted from great science over the years. But if a doctor is telling you he invented DCVax-L before Dr. Liau, but just never got around to doing a trial and patenting it, that's a fish tale.
I did not suggest they sell Flaskworks. I may have pretended to follow the logic of becoming an equipment manufacturer, but that is definitely not something I'd suggest they do. I doubt they would get any more for it than they paid, probably much less at this stage, once stripped of its founder and the core value has been taken out by NWBO and patented for themselves. I really can't see any value at this stage in doing any of that. The could buy Advent, fold it into Advent, spin it out keeping some equity, but again, any equity diverted to a low margin, competitive business like machinery manufacturing and sale as opposed to putting it into a cancer cure platform that works, that would be wasting money. Selling it would have little value. Buying Advent is likewise not a good use of capital if they don't have to do it basically just for the personnel but keeping a CDMO running generally, internally, like I said, is a diversion of good capital into a marginal business compared to investing those dollars into developing the DCVax platform, assuming it's the amazing, agnostic solid tumor treatment we all believe it to be.
Running any business, other than the business to validate, manufacture and sell DCVax and its relevant potential combination drugs, to make a profit takes precious capital, substantial value from developing DCVax. It would be a distraction. Flaskworks was in the business you suggest, and it did not fly. But also, NWBO's patents for DCVax are process patents. Flaskworks, as it becomes a key part of manufacturing, becomes a key set of patents not just for the machinery, but for DCVax protection. Distribute it, and that s lost. People in the meantime will need to find creative ways to get around the DCVax patents, but you don't want to make it faster and easer for everyone to do it. But also again, the entire venture and notion of IP, seem like magical words in some discussions and lack context or practical meaning for some people in these contexts. It is very important for them to protect their IP. It will be core to their being an economic success, and being an economic success if they really believe in what they are doing, is the only way to ensure that the science of it continues to develop and be provided for patients. If they go out of business because they sell too cheaply, or because they have non-commercial aims, then that will in the end either ensure the end of this science experiment, or hasten competition, or a buyout that Martin Shkreli would be proud of when that buyer gets the shell of the remaining company and ends up charging a million dollars a dose for DCVax, because those behind the company wanted to run a social cause rather than a strong, commercial business. I don't think that will be the result, but I do think some think that is the aim. The aim must be to commercialize this technology and ensure that it thrives, develops and endures as a valuable new oncology treatment paradigm.
