Patent Law

CAFC finds TSM test still exists, sort of

Posted on February 09, 2009
The CAFC wrote in Ball Aerosol vs. Limited Brands:The disagreement between the parties?and the sole basis for the district court?s denial of Limited?s motion for summary judgment of obviousness?is whether a motivation to combine the prior art existed...

It's about damages stupid

Posted on February 09, 2009
Further to an IPBiz comment on the Rooklidge paper ["S.1145 stumbled over apportionment of damages. That's the issue. The other stuff was window-dressing. Yes, the courts changed some things. But the real issue remains."], note text in a Reuters report on February 9:A bill to overhaul the U...

Rooklidge's "Reform of a Fast-Moving Target"

Posted on February 08, 2009
A paper written by William C. Rooklidge on patent reform was presented at meetings of the AIPLA and ACPC, and is getting some press. "Reform of a Fast-Moving Target: The Development of Patent Law Since the 2004 National Academies Report" examines the major issues and changes that have occurred in the patent system since the NAS report in 2004...

Vizio issues press release on re-exam of US 5,329,369

Posted on February 08, 2009
The release states: VIZIO, Inc. announced today [Feb. 6] that the U.S. Patent Office has issued a second rejection of all claims in Funai Electric Co.'s United States Patent No. 5,329,369.

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Dumping on Bayh-Dole

Posted on February 08, 2009
David Dickson in Business Daily Africa writes:Yet there is very little empirical evidence to show that the Bayh?Dole Act has had the claimed effect in the United States, let alone that it is appropriate for developing countries. Critics point out for example, that only about five per cent of US universities? income comes from licensing inventions...

Purposeful ignorance in law reviews?

Posted on February 07, 2009
PatentHawk's comment Law school professors often suffer a sordid reputation for strange obsessions, an inability to see the forest for the trees., sort of aimed in the direction of Mark Lemley, reminded IPBiz of a law review article that appeared in 2008, mentioned previously in IPBiz...

AP follows up on Suppes/UMissouri flap

Posted on February 07, 2009
ALAN SCHER ZAGIER has a piece on the Galen Suppes matter.There are quotes from Joshua Powers, an Indiana State University professor who studies tech transfer.The article ended:Suppes' partner, Sutterlin, grew frustrated with the impasse and relocated their startup company to Tuscaloosa, Ala...

AP accuses Shepard Fairey of copyright infringement as to Obama poster

Posted on February 06, 2009
Shepard Fairey the artist who created the famous Obama Hope image (apparently using an AP photo as a model) has been accused of copyright infringement by AP.The inquisitr reports: Fairey?s attorney said that they believed the use of the image falls under fair use, and Fairey did not receive any of the money raised from the use of the image...

PatentHawk smokes Lemley

Posted on February 06, 2009
More critical commentary on the Lemley/Intellectual Ventures collaboration appears on the PatentHawk blog:The bodacious bugaboo bothering these boys is to what extent patent litigation plaintiffs don't practice the asserted invention. Lemley has had a keen interest in "non-practicing entities" for quite some time...

Lemley and friends starting new law firm

Posted on February 05, 2009
AmericanLawyer reported: The San Francisco litigation boutique of Keker & Van Nest is best known for two practices: criminal defense, which is the bailiwick of ex-Marine name partner John Keker; and intellectual property, in which the firm has long represented such blue-chip clients as Google and Comcast...

Rambus stock tumbles on litigation postponement

Posted on February 05, 2009
Forbes (through AP) in Rambus shares tumble after judge halts patent suit noted:Judge Ronald M. Whyte of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California postponed the trial until a separate appeal in the case is resolved.Rambus stock price went down:BWS Financial analyst Hamed Khorsand said the delay could last as long as long as two years...

Justice Ginsberg at Sloan-Kettering following diagnosis of pancreatic cancer

Posted on February 05, 2009
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg had surgery on Feb. 5 after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.[Her son attended UofC law.]

Jaffe: citation is to avoid infringement [!]

Posted on February 05, 2009
Stumbling around the internet, LBE found that one of his papers in IPT had been cited by none other than Adam B. Jaffe in the book Patents, Citations, and Innovations. Most of the cite was on page 277, which was not included on google book search.HOWEVER, what was included on page 278 was a classic...

Philly Inquirer on Obama and stem cells

Posted on February 05, 2009
The article notes that On the campaign trail, Obama pledged to revoke the policy that President George W. Bush imposed in August 2001 but during a CNN interview, did Obama say he would "prefer" that Congress pass legislation removing Bush's restrictions, "because those are the people's representatives...

More on Lemley and Intellectual Ventures

Posted on February 05, 2009
The 271blog has a comment on the collaboration between Lemley and Intellectual Ventures on the extent of NPEs in patent litigation. Within, there is text:Intellectual Ventures executive editor Wayt Gibbs said that an impartial study of patent litigation is necessary...

LA Times editorial goes after Hatch-Waxman deals

Posted on February 05, 2009
In an editorial titled Drug makers' 'pay for delay' schemes, the LA Times states:Last week, the Federal Trade Commission and the California attorney general filed suit in federal court [over the Solvay deal related to AndroGel], calling the deal illegal and anti-competitive...

Earthquake hits New Jersey on Ground Hog Day

Posted on February 03, 2009
Yahoo reported: Won-Young Kim, a seismologist at the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in Palisades, N.Y., says a quake with a preliminary magnitude of 3.0 was recorded at 10:34 p.m. Monday [2 Feb 09], centered in the Morris County communities of Rockaway, Dover and Morris Plains...

Jon Dudas to Foley & Lardner DC office

Posted on February 03, 2009
Jon Dudas, UofChicago Law '93, is joining Foley & Lardner:?Jon brings a unique mix of talent and experience leveraging both his distinguished tenure within the federal government and his experience as a litigator established prior to his government service,? said Sharon Barner, chair of Foley?s intellectual property department, in a statement...

LA Times still getting it wrong on stem cells

Posted on February 03, 2009
Eric Bailey writes: Critics have grumbled that the agency has oversold promises of stem cell cures and of the potential payback to state coffers from royalties earned from scientific discoveries. Even with last week?s announcement of a clinical trial, many institute boosters say real-world treatments, and any financial benefit to the state, might be a decade away...

Gregg at Commerce?

Posted on February 03, 2009
CQ notes that Senator Judd Gregg ( nominee for Commerce, which includes the USPTO) voted in 1995 to kill off the Department of Commerce.Separately: Ultimately, the Commerce Department survived, and Gregg has since shown more interest than most of his Republican colleagues in funding some of its agencies, particularly the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration...

Sasha, Malia "Beanie Babies" retired

Posted on February 03, 2009
The Chicago Tribune reported: On Monday, 2 Feb. 09, Ty Warner, founder and CEO of Ty, Inc., the Beanie Babies empire based in Westmont, announced that the controversial pair [ "Marvelous Malia" and "Sweet Sasha" ] had been "retired" "in deference to the wishes of the First Family...

Information from Galen Suppes in UMissouri matter

Posted on February 03, 2009
IPBiz received the following from Professor Suppes:I believe that the main reason the University filed the lawsuit against me was that that was an effective way to terminate the grievance panel (filed 1/08) from making a recommendation within the next 30 days...

All appellants lose at CAFC in KCI v. Blue Sky on vacuum bandages

Posted on February 02, 2009
The CAFC concluded:For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the district court?s denial of Defendants? motion for JMOL of obviousness and its determinations that certain claim terms were not indefinite. We also deny Defendants? request for a new trial on obviousness...

Californians waking up to CIRM funding issues?

Posted on February 01, 2009
Terri Somers, a cheerleader for CIRM in the past, noted potential problems for continued CIRM funding:Because taxpayers voted to allow the institute to spend $3 billion to support stem cell research, the state is obligated to pay the grants it issues, said Robert Klein, the institute's chairman...

Benefits of patent examination in Canada?

Posted on February 01, 2009
As discussion of deferred examination make the rounds on blogs, one commenter on the Patent Hawk blog was pushing examination in Canada:There are many good tactical reasons for using the present deferred exam in the US, particularly with international applications...

Polk Wagner, again confused on patent law?

Posted on February 01, 2009
IPBiz has commented on the bad scholarship of Polk Wagner in previous posts [Bad cite check in U Penn Law Review and Gross error in the eBay brief to Supreme Court in MercExchange case].Gizmodo, nevertheless, went to Polk Wagner for insight on Apple's US Patent 7,479,949 [Touch screen device, method, and graphical user interface for determining commands by applying heuristics ] and here is the result:To help guide us through, machete in hand, what is one of the more confusing jungles of U...

Pfizer/Wyeth: bad for New Jersey?

Posted on February 01, 2009
Forbes has a post with text:"Jersey is in trouble because it has so many pharmaceutical companies and they're all looking to cut costs and reduce head counts," said Jon LeCroy, a pharmaceutical industry analyst at Natixis Bleichroeder. "A big chunk of its Wyeth workers are at risk, especially the 900 in its main office...

Yahoo on SuperBowl 43

Posted on February 01, 2009
Cardinals strike backAfter being dominated for most of the first half, Arizona has made a game of Super Bowl XLIII.

Obviousness overcome

Posted on January 31, 2009
In SÜD-CHEMIE, INC. v. MULTISORB TECHNOLOGIES, INC., the CAFC vacated and remanded a district court finding of obviousness on summary judgment.The CAFC noted: However, in concluding that Komatsu teaches the use of compatible polymeric materials, the district court failed to acknowledge that the specified classes of materials comprise a large number of substances with quite different properties, and that various combinations of those materials can be compatible or incompatible depending on how they are assembled in layers to form the container...

More plagiarism at SIU: in its anti-plagiarism policy!

Posted on January 31, 2009
Continuing its saga of ineptitude, Southern Illinois University [SIU] apparently plagiarized its anti-plagiarism policy from Indiana University.Showing a degree of reciprocity, Pamela Freeman, director of the office of student ethics and anti-harassment at Indiana University-Bloomington is quoted: "I'm sure it's completely inadvertent...

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