10x Genomics has settled patent infringement lawsuits with a pair of rivals, Bruker and Vizgen, through settlements that could reshape competition within the emerging single-cell and spatial genomics fields.
On Wednesday of last week, Bruker said it became the second rival to settle with 10x in recent weeks, announcing that it had reached a “final settlement” intended to resolve their patent disputes and dismiss multiple lawsuits, while establishing a global series of patent cross-license agreements between the companies.
As a result of the settlement, ongoing lawsuits and administrative proceedings filed by both companies in several countries will be withdrawn, including actions pending in the United States, Germany, and before the European Unified Patent Court.
“This is honestly such good news,” said Arutha Kulasinghe, PhD, head of the clinical-oMx lab at the Frazer Institute, University of Queensland & the Queensland Spatial Biology Centre (QSBC) at the Wesley Research Institute. “Finally…a reset. Let’s refocus on the science.”
In its announcement of the settlement, 10x stated that Bruker will pay it $68 million in equal quarterly installments between the third quarter of 2025 and the second quarter of 2026, as well as ongoing royalties on sales of its spatial biology products through the life of the licensed patents.
“This is a great outcome for the scientific community, who can continue their work using Bruker’s CosMx and GeoMx spatial biology platforms without concern that litigation could interfere with their advancements in oncology, neurobiology, and other fields of research,” Mark R. Munch, PhD, president of the Bruker Nano Group, said in a statement. “We’re excited to be able to focus on the impact and value that these products provide for discovery research, translational research, and precision medicine, and we’re happy to have the distraction and expense of these legal cases behind us.”
In the statement and in an interview conducted last week, Serge Saxonov, CEO of 10x Genomics, defended 10x’s litigation strategy against competitors. “At 10x, we’ve always believed that bold, original science must be protected, not just for the benefit of a company, but for the entire scientific ecosystem,” Saxonov added. “It’s imperative for us to protect our inventions, given how much we invest and how important that is to the mission of the company. And if others end up infringing and copying our inventions, then we have to protect them. It is incumbent on us, both as a means of serving our mission and as a means of being fair to all our stakeholders.”
Vizgen settles earlier
Earlier this year, 10x and Vizgen confirmed having settled their patent litigation, which centered on 10x’s Xenium In Situ single-cell spatial imaging platform and Vizgen’s MERSCOPE, designed to enable massively multiplexed, genome-scale nucleic acid imaging with what Vizgen says is high accuracy and unrivaled detection efficiency at subcellular resolution. MERSCOPE is intended to facilitate a wide range of tissue-scale basic research and translational medicine in oncology, immunology, neuroscience, infectious disease, developmental biology, cell therapy, and gene therapy.
The companies differ in what they have said publicly about their settlement. In its quarterly Form 10-Q filing, 10x said that it was paid $26 million upfront to resolve the litigation by Vizgen, which 10x said also agreed to pay it royalties on sales of products covered by IP that 10x exclusively licenses from Harvard University. Within its financial results, 10x recorded the $26 million upfront payment as a $9.2 million gain on settlement and $16.8 million of license and royalty revenue.
Xenium In Situ was developed by 10x using technology from ReadCoor, a company that 10x acquired in 2020 for $350 million. ReadCoor was founded by George M. Church, PhD, of Harvard Medical School. In 2016, Harvard licensed patents covering the technology exclusively to ReadCoor. In May 2024, a U.S. District Court judge granted Vizgen’s motion to expand its antitrust case against 10x and Harvard by adding allegations that accused both of conspiring to monopolize the market by obstructing Vizgen’s ability to compete globally. 10x denied wrongdoing and vowed to fight the antitrust allegations.
“During the quarter, we settled our worldwide patent litigation with Vizgen on very favorable terms,” Saxonov told analysts May 8 on the company’s earnings call to discuss first quarter 2025 results. “As one component of the settlement, we received $26 million that we allocated in part to operating expenses related to gain on settlement and in part to license and royalty revenue.”
Vizgen takes exception to Saxonov’s remarks.
“We find the comments made during the 10x Genomics earnings call to be incomplete and potentially misleading, because they do not fully characterize all of the payments and licensing at the core of the settlement agreement, which notably was reached among three parties,” Vizgen stated exclusively to GEN, referring to itself, 10x, and Harvard University.
“We believe this settlement reached was not only a victory for Vizgen but also a broader victory for technology innovation and scientific discovery through spatial biology. Vizgen settled its litigation with 10X Genomics and Harvard with the integrity of not having weaponized intellectual property and with gratitude to researchers who trust us to serve them in their science,” Vizgen added. “Our intellectual property portfolio is strong, and we move forward with the support of a global community of researchers and a commitment to continued innovation.”
In the interview, conducted before Vizgen issued its statement, Saxonov said: “We are very happy with the outcome of the Vizgen case. It certainly validates our intellectual property portfolio, and it certainly reinforces our overall strategy.
”The settlement comes seven months after Vizgen combined with Ultivue to form a single company under the Vizgen name, focused on offering both single-cell spatial genomics and multiplex proteomic profiling technologies.
Victory and validation
Bruker created the Bruker Nano Group last year after expanding within spatial biology by acquiring the assets of NanoString Technologies for approximately $392.6 million cash, plus assumption of liabilities, after winning a competitive bankruptcy court auction.
The auction was set after NanoString joined three of its subsidiaries in filing for protection from creditors under Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code in February 2024. NanoString blamed a $31 million jury award assessed against it last November in a patent infringement case filed by 10x.
NanoString had mounted an unusually public defense of its actions and decision to file for Chapter 11, and voiced equally unusual public criticism of a competitor, accusing 10x of seeking to stifle innovation through litigation.
Joining NanoString in that criticism have been a dozen leading scientists from 10 academic institutions. In a pointed commentary published last year in GEN, the scientists expressed alarm over what they called the negative impact that patent litigation is having on the field of spatial biology, and advocated unspecified antitrust action “to safeguard the spirit of exploration and innovation in spatial biology.”
10x responded to that commentary through a letter it issued to customers and partners and posted on its website. In that letter, Saxonov and another co-founder of the company, CSO Ben Hindson, committed the company to continuing its pursuit of innovation: “The narrative portraying 10x as impeding scientific progress could not be further from the truth.”
But now, this litigation is behind the spatial field, and spatial biologists are breathing a sigh of relief that they can focus on the science. “It is great to see that access to diverse spatial genomics solutions is now secured,” said Holger Heyn, PhD, research professor at ICREA (Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats) and co-founder of OmniScope. “Having multiple options with different strengths allows us, as users, to choose the most fit-for-purpose method for our specific needs.”
