The grant, stated plainly. On August 15, 2023, Novartis was issued US11725246B2, covering methods of treating ophthalmic disorders. The CPC tags — C07K 16/22 (anti-growth-factor antibody), A61P 27/02 (eye disease), plus the C12Q 1/6883 biomarker series — pair a VEGF-directed therapy with patient-selection methodology.
Why the anti-VEGF frame matters: treatment of macular degeneration and related eye diseases is one of the most commercially significant and contested franchises in therapeutics, with multiple anti-VEGF agents, biosimilars, and longer-acting follow-ons competing. Method-of-treatment and biomarker IP shapes who can claim differentiated use, which is a regulatory and competitive lever.
The disciplined read: a method-of-treatment grant is an exclusivity claim on how a therapy is used, not on the molecule alone and not a clinical outcome. The business stakes ride on label, durability, and dosing differentiation — questions answered by regulatory action and data, not the patent.
What the grant does not say: nothing about a specific approval, nothing about head-to-head superiority, and nothing about freedom from competing anti-VEGF composition estates. Those live in separate records.
The takeaway: when tracking the anti-VEGF franchise, read the method and biomarker grants as competitive-positioning IP layered on the core molecules. Novartis' August 2023 ophthalmic grant is a dated example in this contested lane.