Legal News

Bilski! Supremes Grant Cert on Business-Method Patent Case

By Ashby Jones

This just in: The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to hear the case In re Bilski, on appeal from the Federal Circuit.

At issue is the viability of so-called business-method patents, that is, whether business methods and processes are patentable. Click here for coverage from Scotusblog.

In a 9-3 decision, the Federal Circuit last October upheld a ruling made by the Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences that denied a patent for a method of hedging in commodities trading developed by Bernard Bilski and Rand Warsaw. Click here for our post on the ruling, which links to previous coverage on the Bilski case.

The Federal Circuit ruling in the case largely disavowed the controversial State Street Bank case of 1998. There, the Federal Circuit opened the door to business method patents, which had until then been excluded from patent protection, by granting protection to a system for managing mutual fund accounts. The decision, according to its detractors - which included several members of the Supreme Court - had led to the issuance of weak patents and exposed financial services companies to high-dollar litigation over business method patents.

Laurence Rogers, a patent lawyer with Ropes & Gray in New York, says he wouldn’t be surprised if the Supreme Court reverses — or at least revises much of — the Federal Circuit’s decision. “The Supreme Court doesn’t get involved in patent cases unless it sees something it doesn’t like,” says Rogers. Rogers says the Court’s ruling could go beyond just the narrow issue of business-method patents. “The lower court’s ruling went to the heart of what’s patentable,” he says.

Click here for the petition for cert, courtesy of Scotusblog, signed by lawyers at Finnegan Henderson. Click here for the opposition, filed by DOJ lawyers.

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on June 01, 2009 (boomark / email).