Posts Tagged: "SCOTUS"

Supreme Court Denies Five IP Petitions on Issues from IPR Joinder to Contributory Trademark Infringement

On February 20, the U.S. Supreme Court issued an order list that denied petitions for writ of certiorari filed in at least five intellectual property cases. While none of these cases induced large numbers of amici to ask the Court to grant cert, they do represent several current issues in IP law that remain unaddressed. From the use of joinder to evade time-bar limits in patent validity proceedings to the service of process required for a grant of preliminary injunction, the Court’s cert denials leave several open questions with which the patent and trademark community will likely grapple.

Law School Amici Urge SCOTUS to Grant Kroger Petition on Trademark Confusion and Resolve Circuit Conflict

Three law school faculty and students filed an amicus brief earlier this week urging the U.S. Supreme Court to reverse a trademark decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit regarding the legal standard for trademark confusion. The brief asks the Court to “end the contradiction and confusion” around the different approaches taken to the likelihood of confusion analysis by federal courts.

Liquidia Urges SCOTUS to Restore Preclusive Effect to PTAB Final Written Decisions

Last week, biopharmaceutical company Liquidia Technologies filed a petition for writ of certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court to appeal a Federal Circuit ruling that affirmed induced infringement findings against Liquidia following the patent at issue being invalidated at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB). In the petition, Liquidia argues that two previous Supreme Court rulings lead to a result contrary to the Federal Circuit’s determination that the invalidation of patent claims at the PTAB do not have preclusive effect on infringement litigation pending an appeal of the PTAB’s decision.

SCOTUS Grants Solicitor General’s Bid to Argue in Case About Retrospective Relief Under Copyright Act

The U.S. Supreme Court today granted a request by the U.S. Solicitor General to participate in oral argument as an amicus in Warner Chappell Music v. Nealy, which challenges a circuit court ruling that, under the discovery accrual rule, monetary damages for infringement under the Copyright Act are available for acts occurring outside of the Copyright Act’s three-year statute of limitations. The Solicitor General is urging the Supreme Court to affirm the lower ruling and uphold the Eleventh Circuit’s interpretation of the High Court’s ruling in Petrella v. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (2013) over competing interpretations in the Second Circuit.

Justices Seem Split Down Party Lines as Chevron Nears Chopping Block

The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments today in two cases that are challenging the so-called Chevron deference doctrine, which says courts should defer to administrative agencies’ interpretation of the statutes delegated to them when there is an ambiguity. While the conservative justices’ questioning largely leaned in favor of scrapping the doctrine, Justices Kagan, Sotomayor and Jackson pushed back on the petitioners’ arguments, predicting chaos, and the U.S. Solicitor General said overruling such a foundational doctrine would result in “endless litigation.”