Theodore Chiacchio
Posts by Theodore Chiacchio
Guideposts for Determining Whether a Mark is Functioning as a Trademark
Under the Lanham Act, a trademark is any combination of words, names, symbols, or devices that are used to identify and distinguish goods or services and to …
What Baby Yoda and T-Mobile’s Magenta Mark Can Teach Us About When to Enforce IP Rights
Deciding whether or not to enforce one’s intellectual property rights is a significant decision for any business (or individual). Litigation in general tends to be an …
Top Tips for Maintaining Adequate Quality Control Over Trademark Licensees
In order for rights in a trademark to persist, the mark must be used in commerce continuously. Wallack v. Idexx Labs., Inc., No. 11CV2996-GPC(KSC), 2015 WL 5943844, …
Federal Circuit Treatment of ‘Commercial Success’ in Hatch-Waxman Cases
In order to establish that the commercial success factor supports a non-obviousness finding, the patentee must establish that a connection (or nexus) exists between the novel aspects …
Patent Eligibility Determinations in Life Sciences Patent Cases
This article examines Supreme Court and Federal Circuit analyses of patent eligibility under 35 U.S.C. § 101 where the patent claims at issue were directed to Life Sciences-related …
Federal Circuit Treatment of Inherency Arguments Aimed at Method of Treatment Patent Claims
This article examines Federal Circuit case law analyzing validity challenges to method of treatment patent claims where the claims at issue are alleged to recite an inherent …
The Federal Circuit’s Approach to the Infringement Analysis in Hatch-Waxman Cases
35 U.S.C. § 271(e)(2) provides that it shall be an act of infringement to submit an Abbreviated New Drug Application (“ANDA”) “if the purpose of such submission …
Examining CAFC Application of §271(g)(1)’s ‘Materially Changed’ Exception to Infringement Liability
35 U.S.C. § 271(g) was enacted in 1988 as part of the Process Patents Amendments Act to address instances where would-be infringers were avoiding infringement liability by using …
Analyzing obviousness and anticipation challenges to claims directed to an isolated component of a prior art mixture
Based on the governing Federal Circuit case law, where the patent claim at issue is directed to a specific component (such as a specific enantiomer) of a …
Avoiding drug development clinical trials from being an invalidating public use
The legal principles set out above, while seemingly straight-forward enough, leave ample room for case-specific interpretation and application when it comes to the question of whether the …
A review of enhanced damages since Halo: Minimizing potential exposure to enhanced damages
Since the Supreme Court’s decision in Halo, there have been approximately 100 cases analyzing whether the adjudged infringer acted egregiously/willfully en route to a determination of …