Abstract
Millennium Pharmaceuticals is a public company, founded in 1993 and based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that has pioneered the exploitation of genomic methods in the identification of novel therapeutic targets. By exploiting its technologies it was able to generate substantial revenues through strategic partnerships with companies such as Bayer, Aventis and Abbott. These revenues augmented the cash raised from its flotation and have enabled Millennium to revise its corporate strategic, by acquiring the product-driven pharmaceutical biotechnology companies Leukosite and COR Therapeutics, and evolve towards its aim of becoming an integrated pharmaceutical company. This analysis of its patenting activity since its inception indicates that genomic-related patent applications still currently account for most of its patenting activities.