Intellectual Property Expert Group
Intellectual Property Expert Group
Mozart’s unlikely plot in The Marriage of Figaro seems at first blush to have little bearing on patent law, but the concepts of deliberate indifference to known risks, and culpability for actively inducing a wrong by an innocent third party,…
In 2007 the U.S. Supreme Court decided its first patent obviousness case in decades, KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex, Inc., 550 U.S. 398 (2007). Shortly thereafter, the PTO issued a set of examination guidelines, based on KSR. Almost three years…
In 2010 two landmark court rulings regarding DNA sequence patents were given in the US. In the first one, Association for Molecular Pathology et al. v. United States Patent and Trademark Office et al. US Federal District Court Judge Robert…
When Bernard Bilski sought to patent a method for hedging against weather-driven changes in energy prices, he undoubtedly never anticipated the storm of legal controversy that would ensue. Bilski’s 1997 patent application took center stage in a struggle to establish…
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced on Nov. 6 the first of a possible series of public hearings to explore the evolving market for intellectual property (IP). The hearings will be held beginning on December 5, 2008, in Washington, DC.…
The US Supreme Court today delivered its unanimous decision providing new insights into the doctrine of patent exhaustion. The opinion reverses the Federal Circuit and holds that under the exhaustion doctrine applies to the authorized sale of components that “substantially…
Standard setting is a big issue in patent circles these days, not only in the US, but equally in Europe. One wonders therefore what effect, if any, the decision of April 22 of the US Court of Appeals for the…
Will the US Congress pass Patent Reform legislation this month? IPO vs. Professor Crouch: In a rare attack on an academic’s view, IPO notes the pronouncement by Professor Dennis Crouch that the legislation will not be enacted by Congress, Congressional Patent…
“We build and create by bringing to the tangible and palpable reality around us new works based on instinct, simple logic, ordinary inferences, extraordinary ideas, and sometimes even genius.” A citation from the opinion of the US Supreme Court in…
On October 31, 2006 we blogged about the case Microsoft Corp. v. AT&T Corp. where the US Supreme Court accepted to hear a case about “extra territoriality” under US Patent Law art. 35 (USC § 271(f). On February 21, 2007,…
Every once in a while this blog pays attention to patent cases outside Europe, if there is an impact for Europe and European patent pratise.Surely this is the case for the decision by the US Supreme in MedImmune, Inc. v.…
In an earlier blog (“Undesirable Software Patents and the US case KSR vs. Teleflex”) we reported on the case KSR vs. Teleflex. This is not just a patent case, it has wider implications, also for Europe. If the plaintiff gets…
On August 2, 2006 The Federal Trade Commission unanimously decided that computer technology developer Rambus, Inc. engaged in a course of deceptive conduct that distorted a critical standard-setting process, resulting in an unlawful monopoly in the markets for four computer…
In May 2006, a jury in the U.S. District Court of Massachusetts in Boston issued an initial decision in the case of Ariad Pharmaceuticals et al v. Eli Lilly and Company. The federal jury’s verdict is that U.S. Patent No.…
Corporate America celebrated when the international agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) went into effect Jan. 1, 1995. Many companies believed TRIPS would go a long way toward protecting their IP rights overseas. Patent owners were especially…