COMPASS Pathways’ Synthetic Psilocybin Patent Challenged

COMPASS Pathways’ “infamous” patent on synthetic psilocybin has been challenged by a non-profit group, according to VICE’s Shayla Love.

In her latest piece of journalism covering the psychedelics space Love explains the challenge in detail, which necessarily includes an explanation of crystal polymorphism itself. Such detail couldn’t possibly be summarised here, but if you’re short on time the TL;DR of the piece is:

“the petition argues the case that these same three crystalline forms have been made over and over since psilocybin was first synthesized—and that Compass’ Polymorph A is no different.”

The group challenging the patent is Freedom to Operate, a non-profit group dedicated to “protecting psychedelic science and medical development for public benefit,” of which Carey Turnbull is at the helm. You can download the post-grant review petition here.

Turnbull footed around half of the bill for the research that underpins the challenge, which took months of work and costed close to a million dollars, Love reports. The rest came from donors like Bill Linton, Bronner’s Soaps, The Steve and Alexandra Cohen Foundation and Evolve Foundation, according to Carey Turnbull.

That expense begins to make sense when you read that researchers involved in the challenge had to scour the world for “high-quality synthetic psilocybin stored in safe conditions,” with one such sample being a 1963 bottle of Sandoz psilocybin, obtained via NIDA’s Drug Supply Program. Turnbull told Psilocybin Alpha that the sample most extensively used in the research was obtained via Rolan Griffiths’ lab at Johns Hopkins University, and was made by Heffter Research Institute founder Dave Nichols.

What’s next? COMPASS Pathways has 3 months to respond to the post-grant review that this research has informed. Then, the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) decides whether a case should proceed to trial. If it does, a lengthy process ensues.

The company responded to the story by stating that they “remain highly confident in the strength of our patents and our polymorph A is the subject of numerous granted patents from several different Patent Offices, confirming that it is novel and inventive.”

This isn’t the first time the company’s patents have been questioned, however. In July of this year, A patent examiner at the UK IP Office issued an opinion on Compass Pathways’ UK Polymorph A patent (GB2572023), having received a request for opinion from Kohn & Associates acting on behalf of Freedom to Operate. The examiner found a number of claims to be lacking an “inventive step,” a foundational tenet of the patent regime.

However, an earlier petition for post-grant review levied at COMPASS was denied in 2020, with the PTAB concluding that the petitioner failed to show that “it is more likely than not” that claims were unpatentable as obvious.

This will certainly be an interesting development to watch, and one that COMPASS is no doubt gearing up to fight. Just yesterday, COMPASS announced the forthcoming appointment of a new Chief Legal Officer (and, the departure of co-founder Lars Wilde as Chief Business Officer), Matthew Owens. Owens was formerly responsible for legal and IP strategy at Novartis, in his role as Global Head Legal, Digital.

There’s also a publication to look out for: some of the researchers hired by the non-profit have submitted additional findings to an academic crystallography journal, which they hope will be published in due course.