Posts Tagged: "infringement"

In a decision barely reaching 11 pages, a unanimous Supreme Court in Limelight Networks, Inc. v. Akamai Technologies reversed and remanded the Federal Circuit’s per curiam majority ruling in Akamai Technologies and McKesson Technologies. That the Supreme Court overturned the Federal Circuit’s per curiam majority ruling is not a surprise. But what is truly shocking are the factually inaccurate statements, as well as the problematical reasoning that appears in Justice Alito’s opinion for this unanimous Supreme Court. With all due respect, Alito’s opinion is an abysmal ”comedy of errors.”

According to data from Lex Machina, in 2013, average patent infringement awards increased 28% and median patent infringement awards increased 22% when compared with infringement damages awards during 2012. The question for in-house attorneys, as well as for plaintiffs attorneys, is whether this trend will continue in 2014 and beyond.

Akamai argued Limelight ”provides instructions and offers technical assistance” to its customers regarding how to tag. The Federal Circuit dodged the question about whether there was direct infringement under 35 U.S.C. 271(a), but instead found that there was induced infringement under 35 U.S.C. 271(b). The problem with this ruling was that it was a legal impossibility. Well settled law had long stood for the proposition that there can be no induced infringement if there is not indirect infringement. Thus, this bizarre ruling by the Federal Circuit had those in the patent community scratching their head. It was easy to predict a Supreme Court reversal.

The Main Street Patent Coalition may be the entity with the single most misleading name in the history of misleading organization names…. According to the LA Time, White Castle has 9,600 employees. How exactly is that a small business? … The corporate members of the National Restaurant Association, and the members of the National Retail Federation are some of the largest corporations in the United States. The American Gaming Association membership likewise includes some of the largest corporations in America, including several of the largest banks in the world, including Goldman, Sachs and Morgan Stanley.

The Supreme Court on June 24, 2013, called for the views of the Solicitor General on petitions to review the Federal Circuit’s en banc decision on joint infringement of process patents. That decision held that induced infringement of a process patent claim may be found even though no single entity performed all of the claimed steps as long as claim steps are performed collectively by multiple parties

Stone Temple Pilots has filed a lawsuit against its former lead singer, Scott Weiland, claiming in part that they kicked him out back in February of 2013, yet Weiland (who now performs solo) continues to use the band’s name for his own performances, which allegedly violates the band’s partnership agreement.

In Ultramercial I and II, the patentee (Ultramercial) asserted that U.S. Pat. No. 7,346,545 (the ‘545 patent) was infringed by Hulu, LLC (“Hulu”), YouTube, LLC (“YouTube”), and WildTangent, Inc. (“WildTangent”). The ‘545 patent relates to a method for distributing copyrighted products (e.g., songs, movies, books, etc.) over the Internet for free in exchange for viewing an advertisement with the advertiser paying for the copyrighted content. WildTangent’s motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim was granted by the district court based on the claimed method being patent-ineligible under 35 U.S.C. § 101

In this case, the Supreme Court considered an arrangement by which brand firm Solvay paid generics Watson (now Actavis) and Paddock roughly $30 to $40 million to delay entering the market with generic versions of testosterone gel. The Eleventh Circuit upheld the activity, concluding that “absent sham litigation or fraud in obtaining the patent, a reverse payment settlement is immune from antitrust attack so long as its anticompetitive effects fall within the scope of the exclusionary potential of the patent.” The court explained that “[p]atent holders have a ‘lawful right to exclude others from the market’” and that a patent “conveys the right to cripple competition.”

The Supreme Court reversed the Eleventh Circuit, concluding that, while a valid patent allows a patentee to charge “higher-than-competitive” prices, “an invalidated patent carries with it no such right.” The Court recognized the policy encouraging settlements. But for five reasons, it found that that policy did not dictate immunity for pay-for-delay settlements.

Keurig makes and licenses brewers and beverage cartridges (pods) that are known as “K-Cups.” JBR makes beverage cartridges that are known as “OneCups,” which are made to be used with the Keurig brewers. Back in January 2013, the Court held a Markman hearing, which is a pretrial evidentiary hearing that’s typically held whenever someone alleges patent infringement, and a memorandum and order interpreting certain pertinent terms used in two of the patents at issue was issued in March 2013. The current case deals with JBR’s motions for summary judgment with respect to the issue of infringement of the entire design patent (referred to as the ‘362 patent) and certain specific claims associated with two of the brewer patents (the ‘138 and the ‘488 patents).