On August 31, 2012, a sharply divided en banc Federal Circuit Court of Appeals issued its opinion in Akami Technologies v. Limelight Networks. The case is significant in that it rewrites the rules for finding a party liable for inducing patent infringement.
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When I talk to lawyers who do not practice patent law, they often speak of the complexity of patent cases in terms of the scientific or technological issues involved. What many of them fail to understand is that quite apart from the
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The courts continue to wrestle with the difficult question of what types of things can be patented (i.e., what constitutes statutory subject matter). Last week, the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals issued its post-remand opinion in Association for Molecular Pathology, et al.,
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The discovery rules in federal litigation provide a powerful mechanism for obtaining evidence necessary to defend against claims of patent infringement. However, anyone who has been through the process knows that it can be very difficult and contentious, especially when the stakes
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In a recent newsletter, we discussed CLS Bank Int’l, et al. v. Alice Corp. Pty. Ltd. (Case No. 2011-1301)(Fed. Cir. 2012) and the Federal Circuit’s efforts to provide guidance as to the patentability of software in the wake of the Supreme Court’s
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In one of our recent posts, we discussed a technique (“poisoning the well”) that third parties can use to get the examiner who is handling a competitor’s patent application to consider prior art that is not currently of record. Instead of sending
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Many companies build an IP portfolio around particular products, and the portfolio evolves over time as new refinements and improvements to the original concept are developed. This sometimes raises the question of whether various different inventions should be consolidated into a single
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The process of examining U.S. patent application is ex parte and does not involve third parties. The examination is based on the prior art that the applicant submits to the Patent Office and the prior art that the examiner uncovers in his
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Answer: Not much, at least for direct infringement. In order for a patent holder to prove patent infringement, it must demonstrate that an accused infringer supplies a product or performs a method that comprises each limitation of at least one claim of
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We have had the pleasure of working with some inventors who have enjoyed huge success by developing cutting-edge medical devices. This is an area that many people want to break into because it can be very profitable. However, the medical device
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