MMRGlobal Shareholder Update on Patent Litigation, Court Orders All
Five Defendants to Coordination Conference on January 13
LOS ANGELES, CA--(Marketwired - Dec 16, 2013) - MMRGlobal, Inc.
(OTCQB: MMRF), through its wholly owned subsidiary
MyMedicalRecords, Inc. (collectively, "MMR"), a leading provider of
Personal Health Records ("PHRs"), MyEsafeDepositBox storage
solutions and electronic document management and imaging systems
for healthcare professionals, today announced that it filed a
second complaint for patent infringement against Walgreen Co. on
December 13, 2013 in the United States District Court Central
District of California, Case No. 2:13-cv-9214 relating to MMR's
U.S. Patent No. 8,498,883 (the "883 Patent"). Walgreens had
previously stipulated to amend MMR's existing January 29, 2013
complaint in which MMR alleged infringement of its U.S. Patent No.
8,301,466 (the "466 Patent"), Case No. 2:13-cv-13-00631. At the
time the original complaint was filed, the United States Patent and
Trademark Office had not yet issued the '883 Patent. On
Monday, December 9th, the Court issued an order consolidating
Markman hearings in all pending MMR cases including Walgreen Co.,
Quest Diagnostics, Jardogs, LLC consolidated with Allscripts, and
WebMD Health Corp. As part of the order, the Court ordered all
parties to appear on January 13, 2014 to discuss a consolidated
Markman hearing schedule pertaining to both the '466 Patent and the
'883 Patent.
MMR filed the second complaint against Walgreens to ensure that
MMR's claims regarding Walgreens' infringement of the '883 Patent
would be timely resolved and that the Markman ruling regarding the
'883 Patent would apply to Walgreens as well. Cases against
Allscripts and Quest Diagnostics already include both the '466 and
'883 Patents.
MMR also called attention to a Walgreens court filing of
November 26, 2013 wherein the parties stated the following, "The
parties met on November 19th, 2013 in Deerfield Illinois. They
agreed to schedule a second conference call one week later on
November 26th, 2013. That meeting was rescheduled to December 3,
2013." The filing continued stating, "The parties desire to focus
on a potential resolution over the next week and a half instead of
focusing on motion practice and incurring the costs of attorney's
fees associated therewith." MMR has confirmed the meeting of
December 3rd did occur and attempts to resolve the matter are
ongoing. Notwithstanding the filing of the most current complaint,
in view of the recent court order consolidating the January 13,
2014 Markman hearing against five defendants in MMR's patent
infringement complaints, MMR underlines the fact that the two
companies are still working toward a settlement.
The '883 Patent, entitled "Method for Providing a User with a
Service for Accessing and Collecting Prescriptions," is directed
toward online access and management of prescriptions in retail
pharmacies, mass merchandisers, hospitals and others with
pharmacies inside. The patent covers how consumers, patients,
physicians and other healthcare professionals send prescriptions to
the pharmacy, access prescriptions from a pharmacy, schedule
prescription refills, send reminders regarding prescription refills
including by text or email, and identify adverse drug interactions
by analyzing prescription medications. Based on trends offering
consumers the ability to manage prescriptions online, the Company
believes this "Prescription Management" patent to be extremely
relevant to its business of selling its products and services
and/or licensing its patented intellectual property to healthcare
professionals and others including retail pharmacies.
MMR is the owner of eight issued patents covering innovations
regarding PHRs and the electronic exchange of medical records,
applications involving inventions pertaining to Personal Health
Records, Patient Portals and other Electronic Health Record
systems. The patents include U.S. Patent Nos. 8,117,045, 8,117,646,
8,121,855, 8,301,466, 8,321,240, 8,352,287, 8,352,288, and
8,498,883. The Company also has recently received Notices of
Allowance for two additional patents from the United States Patent
and Trademark Office. These are for Patent Application Serial No.
13/736,339, entitled "Method and System for Providing Online
Records," and Serial No. 13/714,694, entitled "Method for Providing
a User with a Web-based Service for Accessing and Collecting Health
Records," both of which are awaiting issuance.
In addition to the United States, MMR currently has patents
issued, pending and/or applied for in 11 other countries or
regional authorities including Australia, Singapore, New Zealand,
Mexico, Japan, Canada, Hong Kong, China, South Korea, Israel and
Europe.
About MMRGlobal MMRGlobal, Inc., through its wholly-owned
operating subsidiary, MyMedicalRecords, Inc., provides secure and
easy-to-use online Personal Health Records ("PHRs") and electronic
safe deposit box storage solutions, serving consumers, healthcare
professionals, employers, insurance companies, financial
institutions, retail pharmacies, and professional organizations and
affinity groups. The MyMedicalRecords PHR enables individuals and
families to access their medical records and other important
documents, such as birth certificates, passports, insurance
policies and wills, anytime from anywhere using the Internet.
MyMedicalRecords is built on proprietary, patented technologies to
allow documents, images and voicemail messages to be transmitted
and stored in the system using a variety of methods, including fax,
phone, or file upload without relying on any specific electronic
medical record platform to populate a user's account. The Company's
professional offering, MMRPro, is designed to give physicians'
offices an easy and cost-effective solution to digitizing
paper-based medical records and sharing them with patients through
an integrated patient portal. Through its merger with Favrille,
Inc. in January 2009, the Company acquired intellectual property
biotech assets that include anti-CD20 antibodies and data and
samples from its FavId™/Specifid™ vaccine clinical trials for the
treatment of B-Cell Non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. To learn more about
MMRGlobal, Inc. visit www.mmrglobal.com. View demos and video
tutorials of the Company's products and services at
www.mmrtheater.com.
Forward-Looking Statements All statements in this press release
that are not strictly historical in nature, including, without
limitation, intellectual property enforcement actions, infringement
claims or litigation, intellectual property licenses, and future
performance, management's expectations, beliefs, intentions,
estimates or projections, constitute "forward-looking statements."
Such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks,
uncertainties and other factors that may cause MMR's actual results
to be materially different from historical results or from any
results expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements.
Some can be identified by the use of words (and their derivations)
such as "need," "possibility," "potential," "intend," "offer,"
"development," "if," "negotiate," "when," "begun," "believe,"
"achieve," "will," "estimate," "expect," "maintain," "plan," and
"continue," or the negative of these words. Actual outcomes and
results of operations and the timing of selected events may differ
materially from the results predicted, and any reported results
should not be considered as an indication of future performance.
Such statements are necessarily based on assumptions and estimates
and are subject to various risks and uncertainties, including those
relating to the possible invalidity of the underlying assumptions
and estimates and possible changes or developments in economic,
business, industry, market, legal and regulatory circumstances and
conditions and actions taken or omitted to be taken by third
parties, including customers, suppliers, business partners,
potential licensees, competitors and legislative, judicial and
other governmental authorities and officials. Factors that could
cause or contribute to such differences include, but are not
limited to: unexpected outcomes with respect to intellectual
property enforcement actions, claims of intellectual property
infringement and general intellectual property litigation; our
ability to maintain, develop, monetize and protect our patent
portfolio for both MMR's health IT and biotechnology intellectual
property assets in the U.S. and internationally; the timing of
milestone payments in connection with licensing our intellectual
property; our ability to establish and maintain strategic
relationships; changes in our relationships with our licensees; the
risk MMR's products are not adopted or viewed favorably by the
healthcare community and consumer retail market; business
prospects, results of operations or financial condition; risks
related to the current uncertainty and instability in financial and
lending markets, including global economic uncertainties; the
timing and volume of sales and installations; the length of sales
cycles and the installation process; the market's acceptance of new
product and service introductions; competitive product offerings
and promotions; changes in government laws and regulations
including the 2009 HITECH Act and changes in Meaningful Use and the
2010 Affordable Care Act; future changes in tax legislation and
initiatives in the healthcare industry; undetected errors in our
products; the possibility of interruption at our data centers;
risks related to third party vendors; risks related to obtaining
and integrating third-party licensed technology; risks related to a
security breach by third parties; risks associated with recruitment
and retention of key personnel; other litigation matters;
uncertainties associated with doing business internationally across
borders and territories; and additional risks discussed in MMR's
filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. MMR is
providing this information as of the date of this release and,
except as required by applicable law, does not undertake any
obligation to update any forward-looking statements contained in
this release as a result of new information, future events or
otherwise.
CONTACT: Michael Selsman Public Communications Co.
ms@publiccommunications.biz (310)
922-7033