A federal jury ruled that Avilar Therapeutics and RA Capital willfully and maliciously misappropriated a Yale University trade secret tied to a protein-targeting drug platform, awarding New Haven-based Yale and Biohaven $4 million in damages.
Biohaven Ltd. is a biopharmaceutical company focused on developing and commercializing therapies for people with debilitating diseases, with a pipeline spanning neuroscience, immunology, and other therapeutic areas.
The verdict came July 24, 2026, after a trial in the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware. Biohaven and Yale sued Avilar Therapeutics, Inc. and RA Capital Management GP, LLC in March 2023, alleging trade secret misappropriation and breach of Yale's confidentiality agreement with RA Capital.
Yale professor David Spiegel developed the MODA platform to bind and eliminate disease-causing extracellular proteins, presenting it at Yale's Lifesciences Pitchfest in 2018. RA Capital signed a confidentiality agreement with Yale in April 2019 to evaluate a potential partnership, and negotiations ended without a deal that August.
Dr. Vlad Coric, Chief Executive Officer of Biohaven, said, "This verdict confirms what we have said since we filed this case: RA Capital and Avilar improperly used confidential information to advance a competing company, and the jury agreed that they did so willfully and maliciously. We are grateful to the jury for paying careful attention to the evidence and to our legal team for their extraordinary work at trial. Biohaven is appreciative for our continued partnership with academic institutions like Yale, and remains committed to our mission of discovering, developing, and commercializing life-changing therapies for people with debilitating diseases."
Biohaven and Yale allege RA Capital and Avilar, which RA Capital helped establish in 2019, used that information to build a competing drug program instead. The jury awarded Yale $2 million for the contract breach and $1 million each to Yale and Biohaven for the misappropriation.
"Dr. Spiegel's work is the product of years of novel and rigorous research on extracellular degraders at Yale and exemplifies the innovative scholarship Yale faculty have advanced for decades," added Karen Peart, Yale's Associate Vice President for Communications. "Yale is committed to fostering an environment where groundbreaking discoveries can flourish, improving lives, driving economic growth, and strengthening America's competitiveness. Through collaborations with industry partners, the university helps ensure that promising discoveries can be translated efficiently into products and therapies that serve the public good."
