Posts Tagged: "patent infringement"

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) issued a precedential decision today vacating and remanding with instructions to dismiss as moot a district court final judgment that granted enhanced damages for willful infringement to Packet Intelligence LLC. The appeal was brought by NetScout Systems, Inc. against Packet and relates to a co-pending case in which the CAFC today affirmed several decisions of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) holding all challenged claims of four of Packet’s patents unpatentable as obvious.

GlaxoSmithKline filed a four-count civil action for patent infringement in the United States District Court for the District of Delaware late last week seeking damages for Pfizer and BioNTech’s infringing manufacture, use, sale and marketing of both the original “monovalent” and “bivalent” Comirnaty COVID-19 vaccines. The COVID-19 vaccine was quickly rolled out compared to other vaccines in the past and many pharmaceutical companies benefited financially. However, GSK contends their competitors, Pfizer Inc. and Pharmacia & Upjohn Co. LLC (collectively Pfizer) and BioNTech SE, BioNTech Manufacturing GMBH and BioNTech US Inc. (collectively BioNTech) developed their vaccines with GSK’s patented inventions created about a decade earlier.

Late last year, , the United States International Trade Commission (ITC) announced that it would issue a limited exclusion order (LEO) and cease and desist order (CDO) against Apple, Inc. prohibiting Apple from importing and selling its Apple Watch (Series 6 and 7) products in the United States. The case was Certain Light-Based Physiological Measurement Devices and Components Thereof, Investigation No. 337-TA-1276 (“Light-Based Physiological Measurement Devices”), a “Section 337” patent infringement investigation before the ITC that was initiated by Masimo Corporation. Adding insult to injury, the ITC refused to stay these remedial orders pending appeal, putting at immediate risk continued sales of the Apple Watch in the United States. These decisions sent shock waves across both the tech industry and the legal community.

In patent litigation, damages issues are sometimes treated as an afterthought when compared to the issues of infringement and invalidity. However, achieving a client’s goals requires an attorney to place damages at the center of the litigation strategy from the very beginning. Damages, quite simply, can make or break a case. And it is a quickly evolving field, rife with inconsistent judicial decisions, vague standards, and new techniques for measuring damages. Below are some of the current hot topics in patent litigation—and tips for practitioners on both sides of the “v” on how to handle them.

In a precedential decision issued Friday by Judge Leonard Stark, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) affirmed a district court’s judgment that Luv n’ care, Ltd. and Nouri E. Hakim (LNC) succeeded in proving Lindsey Laurain and Eazy-PZ, LLC (EZPZ) were barred from relief due to unclean hands but vacated the court’s judgment for EZPZ of no inequitable conduct. The CAFC also vacated a grant of partial summary judgment of invalidity and vacated orders denying LNC attorney fees and costs.

In a precedential decision authored by Judge Lourie, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed a district court’s final judgment that certain claims of several patents owned by Salix Pharmaceuticals for a drug used to treat irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) and other ailments were invalid as obvious. The CAFC also affirmed an order of the district court that instructed the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) that the effective approval date of generic company Norwich’s Abbreviated New Drug Application (ANDA) may not precede the expiration dates of the claims of three other Salix patents that were found to be valid and infringed by Norwich. Norwich cross-appealed from that order and also from the denial of its motion to modify the district court’s final judgment.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) on Monday affirmed an International Trade Commission (ITC) final determination that said Google infringed five of Sonos, Inc.’s patents but which also found three proposed redesigns did not infringe. Sonos owns U.S. Patent Nos. 10,439,896 (“’896 patent”), 9,195,258 (“’258 patent”), 9,219,959 (“’959 patent”), 10,209,953 (“’953 patent”), and 8,588,949 (“’949 patent”). Sonos filed a complaint with the ITC alleging certain Google audio players and controllers infringed the patents and the ITC agreed, issuing a limited exclusion order and a cease-and-desist order (CDO) preventing Google from marketing the infringing products in the United States.

Did you know that Brazil’s medical device market is experiencing a surge, attracting billions in imports annually? This boom, however, is attracting not only legitimate businesses but also those looking to exploit loopholes. On average, more than US$6.7 billion worth of products are imported annually, with around 14,000 new products being introduced every year. One example is the increase in sales of equipment for endoscopic surgeries, given the rise in the number of bariatric surgeries, which already exceeds 70,000 procedures per year.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) ruled in a precedential decision authored by Judge Prost on Monday that certain claims of Janssen Pharmaceuticals Inc.’s patent for a schizophrenia drug are not indefinite but vacated and remanded the district court’s finding that Teva Pharmaceuticals had not proven all of the claims obvious.

AlexSam, Inc. lost its patent infringement cases against Simon Property Group/Blackhawk Network and Cigna Corporation in two separate decisions issued by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) on Monday, April 1. AlexSam owns U.S. Patent No. 6,000,608, which discloses a “multifunction card system.” Essentially, the invention is a type of gift card that “can serve a number of functions, thus allowing the consumer to have one card which may act as their card for financial transactions, long-distance telephone calls, loyalty information, and medical information.”

In a lengthy, precedential opinion authored by Judge Taranto, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) on Wednesday, March 27, affirmed a district court’s decision invalidating the claims of two of Trading Technologies’ (TT’s) patents as being patent ineligible under Section 101 and also clarified the application of a 2018 Supreme Court ruling on foreign damages. Harris Brumfield, as Trustee for Ascent Trust, is the successor to TT, which sued IBG LLC in 2010 for infringement of four patents: U.S. Patent Nos. 6,766,304; 6,772,132; 7,676,411; and 7,813,996. All of the patents’ specifications describe “assertedly improved graphical user interfaces for commodity trading and methods for placing trade orders using those interfaces.”

On March 27, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit issued a precedential ruling in Inline Plastics Corp. v. Lacerta Group, LLC, on appeal from the District of Massachusetts. Judge Richard Taranto authored the opinion and held that an improper jury instruction given at trial by the district court required vacatur of the court’s final judgment that Inline’s patent claims were invalid for obviousness. The Federal Circuit remanded that portion of the case for a new trial so that the jury can properly consider each objective indicia of nonobviousness raised by Inline at trial.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) today held in a precedential split decision authored by Judge Stoll that the safe harbor provision of 35 U.S.C.§ 271(e)(1) applied to Meril Life Sciences’ importation of two demonstration samples of its transcatheter heart valves to a medical conference. Judge Lourie dissented, explaining that both the district court and the Federal Circuit have erred in interpreting the statute, specifically by failing to adequately consider the word “solely,” under which interpretation it could be reasonably held that Meril “at least partially” imported the valves for commercial reasons.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) today denied Apple’s petition for a writ of mandamus asking the court to compel Judge Alan Albright of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas to transfer its case to the Northern District of California. Carbyne Biometrics sued Apple for infringement of six patents via Apple’s “Secure Enclave” and Apple Cash platform features. Apple moved for transfer in July 2023, the motion was briefed in November 2023 and the district court denied the motion in December 2023 and said it would soon issue a decision. Apple filed the petition for writ of mandamus when no decision had issued by January 31, 2024 asking the CAFC to either stay the proceedings until a decision had issued or to compel transfer.