Patent Litigation

Arming software-patentees with additional precedent in favor of eligibility for software patents post-Alice, the Federal Circuit on June 27, 2016 handed down its decision in BASCOM Global Internet Servs., Inc. v. AT&T Mobility LLC, et al., No. 2015-1763, 2016 U.S. App. LEXIS 11687 (Fed. Cir. June 27, 2016), vacating the lower court’s decision.

On July 5, the Federal Circuit issued another important decision regarding the meaning of certain provisions of the Biologics Price Competition and Innovation Act (BPCIA).

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled on June 20, 2016 in Cuozzo Speed Techs., LLC v. Lee that: (1) the statutory authority of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (“Board”) in instituting an inter partes review (“IPR”) proceeding is final and non-appealable, thereby not being subject to judicial review, and (2) it is appropriate for the Board to construe claims in an issued patent according to their broadest reasonable interpretation, rather than their plain and ordinary meaning as in district court litigation.

The Federal Circuit yesterday issued a decision that will make many patent owners and IP practitioners breathe easier.  In Immersion Corp. v. HTC Corp. the Court reversed a district court holding that a continuation application filed on the same day that its parent application issued is not entitled to the parent priority date.

“You sued them. They stay, period.” This is the conclusion a Texas trial court came to when asked to exclude the designated representative of a party from a hearing where an employee of the other party, a direct competitor, would disclose his employer’s trade secrets.

On Tuesday, April 26, 2016, the Federal Circuit issued an order denying a petition filed by Merck & Cie for rehearing en banc of an Inter Partes Review (“IPR”) final written decision by the Patent Trial and Appeal Board holding several Merck patents invalid as obvious.

On Friday, March 18, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed two District of Delaware rulings that non-resident defendant generic ANDA filer, Mylan, is subject to personal jurisdiction in two Hatch-Waxman suits filed in the state.

It has become a patent litigation trope, discussed at every Silicon Valley water cooler, that patent litigation is broken because all patent cases are tried in the plaintiff-friendly Eastern District of Texas. While this reputation is arguably undeserved, the Eastern District of Texas does end up with the majority of patent cases.

The oft-overlooked design patent has seen somewhat of a revival recently (at least in the media) ever since a jury in California awarded Apple $399 million in damages — i.e., all Samsung profits from the sale of several of its smartphone and tablet devices — for Samsung’s infringement of three Apple design patents in Apple, Inc., v. Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.

Patent owners continue to face an uphill battle at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board.  According to U.S. Patent Office statistics as of December 31, 2015, a majority (72%) of the 529 Inter Partes Reviews (IPR) proceeding to trial and receiving Final Written Decisions ended in all examined claims being invalidated. 

On January 27, 2016, the International Trade Commission (ITC) formally requested a rehearing en banc of a November 10, 2015, Federal Circuit panel decision in ClearCorrect Operating, LLC v. ITC.

On January 22, 2016, the Federal Circuit issued its opinion in Lumen View Technology LLC v. FindTheBest.com (Dkt. No. 15-1275), in which it vacated and remanded the lower court’s award of enhanced attorney fees under 35 U.S.C. § 285.

On Monday, January 4, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit heard oral argument in two appeals that may determine what effect the Supreme Court’s Daimler AG v. Bauman decision will have on the exercise of personal jurisdiction over generic pharmaceutical manufacturers in Hatch-Waxman litigation.

A recent U.S. District Court decision has clarified a potential danger when filing terminal disclaimers that contain overly-broad language. The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois in Hagenbuch v. Sonrai Systems interpreted the terminal disclaimer language “I hereby disclaim the terminal part of any patent granted on the above-identified application or any continuation of it” as applying to any continuation application claiming priority from the application in which this terminal disclaimer was filed.

The International Trade Commission proposed a series of new procedural rules, which were published in the Federal Register on September 24, 2015.

On August 10, 2015, the full US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit issued its en banc opinion in Suprema, Inc. v. ITC, which overturned an earlier panel decision and confirmed, by a 6–4 vote, that the International Trade Commission (ITC) has jurisdiction over allegations of induced infringement.

Late last month, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals issued its much-anticipated decision in Microsoft v. Motorola, a breach of contract action brought by Microsoft alleging that Motorola violated its commitment to license its standard essential patents (SEPs) on reasonable and non-discriminatory (RAND) terms.

On Tuesday, August 11, the Federal Circuit heard oral arguments in ClearCorrect v. International Trade Commission, a case that will decide whether the ITC has the power to exclude intangible items that are imported digitally rather than physically.

The United States Supreme Court’s recent decision in Commil v. Cisco held that a good-faith belief of a patent’s invalidity, standing alone, is insufficient to provide a defense to a claim of inducing another’s infringement of a United States Patent.

Two weeks ago, Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chairwoman Edith Ramirez, writing on her own behalf, submitted comments in Investigation No. 337-TA-613, Certain 3G Mobile Handsets and Components Thereof (the 613 Investigation) on how the International Trade Commission (ITC) should approach the adjudication of the FRAND defense when conducting the public interest analysis.