Two other things that I think are relevant in the context of...

Two other things that I think are relevant in the context of possible patent infringement--the validity and enforceability of MSB's patents and their territoriality.

I know that much has been made of the fact that MSB's patents have been used in infringement proceedings in various countries, and that they have been attacked (by Takeda, I believe, but I could be wrong), and survived that attack.

So that's promising...but it's not really helpful in the context of considering whether ATHX and MAPCs may infringe any of MSB's patents.

Patents have coverage limited to the territory in which they are granted. So if MSB's European patents have survived invalidation proceedings, it's not automatically the case that a US patent for similar technology--which may not yet have been attacked, for example--would similarly survive attack.

Generally, companies file patent applications for new technology in a number of countries, usually through a process called the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) (or the Paris Convention). So an initial Australian application could also via the PCT designate Japan, China, Singapore, the EU (27 countries, one system), the UK, the US, Canada, etc., and when the patent passed through examination in all of those countries, you have rights in all those countries. But you have no rights there UNTIL it's passed the local countries examination process and been granted.

That being said, every country has its own processes for review and examination of claims, and its own arcane rules as to what you can and cannot claim, how you can claim, etc. As well, some patent offices are MUCH better and more thorough at examination than others. The US and EU patent offices, for example, are highly respected, and a lot of countries examining PCT applications rely heavily on findings if patentability from patent offices in those countries to make their own basic determination as to whether/when to grant a patent. But even then, it's possible that the claims in a US patent differ markedly from the claims in an EU patent, where the local offices have their own rules and own views about what's truly novel, what "prior art" (existing technology that anticipates the claims in the patent) covers the proposed claims, etc.

What this all means is that any patents that MSB has that conceivably are being infringed by ATHX may not yet have been tested in invalidation proceedings, either at all, or in the US, where ATHX would most likely be sued.

As well, MSB's precise patents that covered what Takeda was doing (or whomever it was that was alleged to be infringing) may not be involved in an infringement analysis against ATHX.

For one thing, it would likely be US patents--NOT the same EU patents--being brought to bear.

For another, the technology for MAPCs may be sufficiently dissimilar from MSCs that the claims in the patents used against Takeda are too narrow to effectively describe MAPCs. MSB may have other patents, or there may be other claims in the patents used against Takeda, that more arguably and effectively cover what ATHX is doing.

So the short version is:

Just because MSB has patents, and just because some of those patents in the EU were tested and survived, does NOT mean that we can assume the same patents will be used against ATHX and/or that those patents (or any other patents held by MSB) definitively cover MAPCs.