The Business of Patents
Patent cases are very discovery intensive, and many courts now have “patent local rules” that provide regulated process by which plaintiffs disclose their infringement contentions (i.e., explanations of why the defendant’s acts infringe the plaintiff’s patent) and by which defendants disclose their invalidity contentions (i.e., explanations of why the plaintiff’s patent claims are invalid). These […]
Read more →Lately we have been working some inventors who are newer to the patent process, and they are often concerned about providing details about the embodiments of their inventions. Their concern is that when we ask for this information, it means we are narrowing the scope of their invention. However, that is not the case. We […]
Read more →With the implementation of the America Invents Act (AIA), the United States went from a first to invent to a first inventor to file system of determining priority of patent rights. However, that was not all that changed with the implementation of the AIA. The AIA includes some significant changes to the on-sale bar which […]
Read more →When drafting patent claims for a device, it is often desirable to describe the device based on how it works instead of how it is structured. Describing a device based on how it works is often referred to as “functional claiming.” Claims that make use of functional claiming are frequently broader in scope than those […]
Read more →On May 26, 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its opinion in Commil USA, LLC v. Cisco Systems, Inc., (Case No. 13-896, May 26, 2015). A copy of the slip opinion may be found here. Active Inducement of Infringement: A Good Faith Belief in Invalidity is Not a Defense U.S. Patent Law recognizes both direct […]
Read more →This has not been a good year for software patents in the United States. Since the Supreme Court issued its decision in June in Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank, 134 S.Ct. 2347 (2014), the Patent Office has been aggressively rejecting software patent applications and the courts have been invalidating issued software patents for lack of […]
Read more →In last month’s blog, we discussed the Federal Circuit’s decision in X2Y Attenuators, LLC. V. International Trade Commission, a case which demonstrated how limiting descriptions of an invention in a patent specification can be used to restrict the scope of otherwise facially broad claims. This month, in ScriptPro, LLC v. Innovation Associates, Inc.,the Federal Circuit […]
Read more →In an earlier blog post (https://hanseniplaw.com/what-limitations-are-there-on-the-breadth-of-otherwise-novel-and-non-obvious-patent-claims/) we addressed the question of whether and to what extent U.S. law limits the breadth of patent claims that are otherwise novel and non-obvious. As we explained, both the Written Description and Enablement requirements of U.S. patent law may limit claim scope even if the prior art does not. […]
Read more →In our experience, many patent cases are actually a tale of two cases: The case based on the patent holder’s interpretation and application of the claims and the case based on the accused infringer’s interpretation and application of the claims. Both cases involve the same set of patent claims. However, they often involve conflicting ways […]
Read more →On July 2, 2013 the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals issued an opinion in Fresenius USA v. Baxter International, Inc., Case. No. 2012-1334, 1335 (Fed. Cir. July 2, 2013), which enhances the ability of patent infringement defendants to invalidate patents via the ex parte reexamination process. The ex parte reexamination process allows anyone to ask […]
Read more →In a long-awaited decision in Association for Molecular Pathology, et al. v. Myriad Genetics, Inc., et al., the U.S. Supreme Court held on June 13, 2013 that naturally-occurring, isolated genes are not patentable because they do not constitute patentable subject matter under the Patent Statute. With this decision, another chapter has been written in the […]
Read more →Well, we thought so, but now we are not so sure. It seems that the much more is required than the business method itself in order to obtain a patent. The cases suggest that, at a minimum, novel computing features are required. The Federal Circuit’s most recent pronouncement on the issue seems to change little […]
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