SCOTX Says No Ambiguity in Contract Underpinning UT’s $51M Royalty Dispute

A lower court’s ruling that wiped out a $51 million award for the University of Texas System Board of Regents was undone Friday by the Texas Supreme Court after it found UT’s contract with a laboratory that makes veterinary diagnostic tests was unambiguous.

But the unanimous ruling, authored by Chief Justice Nathan Hecht, did not hand the university regents an outright win in the dispute with IDEXX Laboratories. The board of regents had asked the court to reinstate a Harris County trial court’s ruling that it was entitled to $51 million in damages in the royalty dispute over patented technology that detects Lyme disease and is used in veterinary products.