Patent Baristas

The Federal Circuit has demonstrated once again that it is not afraid to effect a sea change in patent law jurisprudence in a big way. Twenty-three years ago, in Underwater Devices v. Morrison-Knudsen Co. (Fed. Cir. 1984) the court declared: “Where . . . a potential infringer has actual notice of another’s patent rights, he […]

Johnson & Johnson has sued the American Red Cross, an indisputably highly regarded charitable organization, over ARC’s “commercial” use of the red cross symbol trademark. It seems that the ARC has been licensing others to use the symbol in connection with first-aid type products sold in retail stores. To raise money, of course. That’s generally […]

On Remand from the Supreme Court, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit applied the broad scope of the research exemption to the Integra case and reversed the district court’s judgment of infringement. Integra Lifesciences v. Merck KGaA (02-1052-1065). Integra Life Sciences has five patents relating to peptides that contain the RGD sequence […]

In Pharmastem Therapeutics v. ViaCell (No. 05-1490/1551) , the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit upheld an earlier decision by the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware that ViaCell, through its marketing of ViaCord does not infringe PharmaStem’s U.S. Patent No. 5,192,553 and U.S. Patent No. 5,004,681, which relate to certain […]

In Takeda v. Alphapharm and Genpharm (06-1329), The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit upheld an earlier decision in the district court finding that U.S. Patent 4,687,777 was not invalid under 35 U.S.C. § 103. Takeda Chem. Indus., Ltd. v. Mylan Labs., 417 F. Supp. 2d 341 (S.D.N.Y. 2006). Earlier, Takeda invented certain […]

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit held that claims with a means plus function limitation – here a “control means” — where there is no corresponding structure described in the specification, are invalid. See, Biomedino, LLC v. Waters Technologies Corporation (2006-1350). Biomedino, LLC had appealed from a lower court decision that claims […]

After refusing to die easy on its bid to put out a generic version of Plavix, Apotex was handed its hat by the district court. Sanofi-Synthelabo v. Apotex Inc., 02cv2255, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York. Granting a permanent injunction, U.S. District Judge Sidney Stein held that Apotex failed to prove by clear […]

While the practice of savings seeds after a harvest to plant the next season is as old as farming itself, farmers have found that patent laws count in the end. In Monsanto v. McFarling (05-1570, -1598), Monsanto went after the farmer for breaching a technology agreement over genetically modified crops that resist glyphosphate herbicide. Upon […]