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Patents Court judgment on heat-not-burn devices

We review the High Court’s decision in Philip Morris Products, SA & Philip Morris Limited v Rai Strategic Holdings, Inc & Nicoventures Trading Limited [2021] EWHC 537 (Pat). The court conducted an assessment of the validity of two patents held by British American Tobacco for heat-not-burn (“HNB”) tobacco products. The court held that the patents were invalid both for lack of inventive step and for added matter.To get more news about Hitaste Hi10, you can visit hitaste.net official website.

Factual background

HNB tobacco products are an innovation in tobacco products which enable production of a nicotine-containing vapour at lower temperatures than traditional cigarettes. Whilst traditional cigarettes burn tobacco and produce smoke, products which employ an HNB system need only be heated in a specially designed chamber and produce a nicotine-containing vapour. By merely heating the tobacco, manufacturers claim that the user may experience less exposure to harmful toxins inherent in smoke inhalation with traditional cigarettes.

The concept of HNB has been around for several decades. However, it is not until recently that companies such as Philip Morris and British American Tobacco have been able to produce devices which are successfully marketable to consumers. The device at the centre of this dispute, Philip Morris’ IQOS device, is the only HNB product on the market in the UK.

The legal arguments

Philip Morris sought revocation of two HNB patents held by two companies in the British American Tobacco (“BAT”) group: Rai Strategic Holdings and Nicoventures Trading Limited (as exclusive licensee of the patents). Philip Morris argued that the patents were invalid on two grounds: first, that the patents contained added matter and second that the patents lacked any inventive step. BAT sought to establish both the validity of their patents and that Philip Morris’ IQOS device infringed those patents.