Lee International

We recently secured a favorable outcome before the Intellectual Property High Court (IPHC) and the Supreme Court in an appeal challenging a decision of the Intellectual Property Trial and Appeal Board (IPTAB) that had denied the inventive step of a complex and highly sophisticated CAR-T cell–related platform technology invention.  On August 21, 2025, the IPHC rendered a decision (Case No. 2024 Heo 13787) to recognize the inventive step of the invention.  Furthermore, the Supreme Court dismissed the appeal submitted by the Ministry of Intellectual Property (MOIP, formerly KIPO) on January 8, 2026, thereby affirming the IPHC’s ruling.

The invention is characterized by a distinctive structural configuration, in which different costimulatory domains, such as CD28 and OX40 or 4-1BB, are separately incorporated into different CARs.  By contrast, the prior art merely addresses combinations of multiple costimulatory domains within a single CAR.  Through detailed experimental data and logical analysis, we demonstrated both the technical significance of distributing different costimulatory domains across two CARs and the unexpected and remarkable effects achieved by this structure, including enhanced cytotoxicity and increased cytokine secretion.

In response to the IPTAB’s determination that it would have been obvious to combine disclosures scattered across multiple prior art references, we emphasized that no specific technical motivation existed to combine those references in the manner alleged.  We further explained, through rigorous reasoning, that such a combination would not lead to the distinctive dual-CAR configuration of the present invention nor to the resulting technical effects.