Posts in Guest Contributors

Patent Filings Round-up: Small Companies Challenge Landmark Lawsuits; Raft of Uniloc/Samsung settlements; Koss Goes After Headphone Market

There was a spike in Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) filings this week—almost double the average, at 56—driven in part by eight new petitions (adding to those previously filed) against patents owned by the Moskowitz family by Globus Medical. That was good enough to rival newly filed complaints for the first time this year (57). It also appears Uniloc (Fortress) and Samsung have come to some sort of agreement, as a handful of pending inter partes reviews (IPRs) settled; Samsung was denied institution in all of the IPRs it has filed against Cellect to date (eight petitions, with 12 still pending—at least some patents have no remaining challenges, meaning the litigation is sure to continue in due course).

Sage Advice on Rising Above Petty Partisanship from Senator Robert Dole

Former Senator Robert Dole turned 97 last week, but he’s still very much engaged in what’s going on right now. He just wrote a powerful op-ed, Innovation is key to defeating COVID-19. Subtitled “Enacted 40 years ago, the Bayh-Dole Act is helping facilitate the development of coronavirus therapies today,” Senator Dole reviews how the law he crafted with former Senator Birch Bayh revolutionized the commercialization of federally-funded inventions. Bayh-Dole paved the way for companies like Moderna to create critically needed therapies to combat our raging pandemic. But there’s another message Senator Dole delivered that’s just as topical.

The New Patent Texas Hold’Em: Before Going All In, Attorneys Should Know that Marshall and Waco are Different Decks

As a jury consultant with a wide breadth of experience across the country, I am often asked about the favorability of certain venues, but I was surprised two years ago at the Eastern District of Texas (EDTX) Bench Bar conference when an attorney friend of mine quietly asked what I thought about Waco as a venue for patent cases. I nearly spit my coffee out: “Waco?  That’s a terrible idea!”  “Why?” he questioned, “Isn’t it a small town just like Marshall or Tyler?” I proceeded at length to explain why the Waco division and Western District of Texas (WDTX) is dramatically different than the Marshall division and EDTX. I simply chalked the question up to a one-off inquiry, until I was asked the same question again multiple times from other attorneys at the last EDTX Bench Bar. It was at the last EDTX conference that all the questions fell into place, when I heard about Judge Albright’s intent to prepare a new patent docket in Waco.

Navigating Patent Drafting and Prosecution of Standards-Related Technologies

As far back as the Roman Empire, standardization has improved the efficiency of human endeavors. In the present day, as high-bandwidth communication and Internet of Things (IoT) applications expand, standardization continues to be key in advancing new technologies. From the standpoint of protecting intellectual property, however, the collaboration required to standardize a technology presents unique challenges, as industry competitors disclose and assess various options for the standard. Standard Development Organizations (SDOs), each directed to a particular technical area, adopt standards that allow devices to communicate with each other and process information consistently. Technical experts representing companies or trade associations in an SDO may submit proposals for consideration and adoption. However, such proposals may include patentable solutions invented within the submitting organizations. By virtue of submitting such proposals for consideration, the solutions could be considered publicly disclosed – or, at the very least, disclosed to industry competitors.

Patents are from Mars, Trade Secrets are From Venus

Back in ancient times, in this case 1990, John Gray, an obscure “relationship counselor” with a correspondence degree in psychology, was perplexed. The communication problems of the heterosexual couples he worked with were so serious that he couldn’t explain them by individual circumstances. His clients seemed to be talking past each other, almost as if they were coming from different planets. With that tired metaphor in mind, he penned the book Men Are from Mars, Women are from Venus, generalizing what he thought were the universal, contrasting communication styles of the sexes…. In effect, [Gray] has become rich by talking about how incompatible men and women are, despite eons of evidence to the contrary. In our world of intellectual property, it once was like this between patents and trade secrets.

Curtain Call For Computer Related Inventions in India: An Analysis of the Ferid Allani Case

The precedent with respect to the patentability of Computer Related Inventions in India ranges from little to non-existent; but not for lack of trying. In December 2019, the High Court of Delhi in Ferid Allani v. Union of India (2009 SCC Online Del 11867) examined the rejection of a patent by the Indian Patent and Appeal Board (IPAB) to a Computer Related Invention (CRI).