Dear Pawsitive I.D. ™ Customers:

From all of us at InGen, we certainly hope you had a good and safe holiday season and we are looking forward to a terrific 2009.



We have now been (re)operating for several weeks and the response we have received from the breeding community has been incredible. Thank you for all the kind words of encouragement and suggestions on how we can better serve your needs. We are still trying to get all the bugs out of our ordering system but believe we have addressed most of the concerns brought to our attention. Any suggestions are always appreciated.



There is an important area I would like to address concerning intellectual property and what International Genetics is involved in. One of our competitors has put a declaration on their website’s home page (http://www.optigen.com/opt9_impmessage.html) imploring its competitors to respect their intellectual property rights. We believe that is a direct shot at InGen for offering Progressive Rod-Cone Degeneration (PRCD) on our Pawsitive I.D. ™ DNA testing platform. This calls for a response because InGen respects all intellectual property rights and IS NOT infringing on any patents, copy rights or trademarks.



Our competitor has the following patents covering METHODS used to determine if certain breeds of dogs have PRCD. The following patents are from the United States Patent & Trademark Office covering the patent in the United States. They also have similar patents in Canada and The European Union:



USPTO Patent #7,312,037



http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-bool.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&co1=AND&d=PTXT&s1=prcd&s2=cornell&OS=prcd+AND+cornell&RS=prcd+AND+cornell



USPTO Patent #5,804,388



http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-bool.html&r=4&f=G&l=50&co1=AND&d=PTXT&s1=prcd&s2=cornell&OS=prcd+AND+cornell&RS=prcd+AND+cornell



These are well written, legitimate patents and InGen respects them. However, by putting the following on their website, we feel that our competitor is inferring we are doing something illegal:

“You may have recently received offers from foreign corporation(s) to have your dog tested for prcd outside of the U.S. to avoid patent protection here. However, offering to sell and selling an invention patented in the U.S. are activities that have been found to be violations of U.S. patent law and Optigen expects all parties to honor its intellectual property rights.”

First, the patents in question are utility patents protecting a scientific method within the jurisdiction covered by the patent. A violation of the patent rights would be called either Direct Patent Infringement or Indirect Patent Infringement. For definitions visit

http://www.ipwatchdog.com/patent/patent-infringement/

InGen is processing DNA samples using the PRCD scientific method in The Bahamas at a new laboratory facility belonging to InGen. Extensive research went into determining if the patents filed in the US, Canada & EU had any legal bearing in The Bahamas. The answer was overwhelmingly NO.

Secondly are the PRCD results. Again extensive research was made in reviewing the patents and it is believed that the RESULTS are not covered in the patents. Numerous case precedents were found that support our position here. But to further insure that InGen is not infringing on any patents regardless of supporting case law, it was decided that the entire sales process would be conducted from a Bahamian website and with a Bahamian Internet Service Provider. Also, all sales are processed through an international merchant account provider (Global Collect) and funds deposited into an international bank account. Therefore, when a sale is made, the entire transaction is conducted outside any jurisdiction covered by any patent.

Our competitors may cry foul but everything InGen is doing is within InGen’s rights and InGen is not infringing nor violating anyone’s intellectual property rights. The business world is tough. InGen has found an ethical “Legal Work Around” of the above patents. Maybe instead of complaining about baseless claims of Honoring Intellectual Property Rights our competitors might look to lower their overly inflated testing prices.

InGen is dedicated to helping the dog breeding community with affordable DNA testing with our Pawsitive I.D. ™ product. Every dog that can be identified with any type of inherited genetic disease will improve the health of the breed. It is to that end that InGen is in business.

I will be sending these updates about Pawsitive I.D. ™ from time to time. We have many exciting improvements in the works. If you do not wish to receive these emails, please send us an email to opt out.

Thank you for your business and support!!!!



Rick Dobbins

General Manager

International Genetics, Inc.