Justia Intellectual Property Opinion Summaries

Millennium developed the patented product for the treatment of oncology diseases, particularly multiple myeloma and mantle cell lymphoma. The product has the brand name Velcade®. Sandoz and others filed abbreviated new drug applications (ANDAs), admitting infringement and seeking to invalidate various claims of the 446 Patent. The district courts held that certain claims were invalid as obvious, 35 U.S.C. 103. In consolidated appeals, the Federal Circuit concluded that the district court erred and that invalidity was not established. Sandoz identified no reference or combination of references that show or suggest a reason to make the claimed compound. The district court clearly erred in its examination of the objective indicia of unexpected results and long-felt need. View "Millenium Pharmaceuticals, Inc. v. Sandoz, Inc." on Justia Law

Genband sells products and services that help telecommunications companies offer voice communications services over Internet Protocol networks (VoIP services) and owns patents related to its offerings. Metaswitch sells telecommunications products and services that compete with Genband’s offerings but was not a major competitor until recent years. After a jury found that Metaswitch infringed various claims of several of Genband’s patents and that those claims had not been proven invalid, Genband sought a permanent injunction. The district court denied the request, concluding that Genband had not established irreparable harm from the infringing activities by alleging that Metaswitch made competing sales. The court indicated that Genband was required to prove that “the patented features drive demand for the product.” The Federal Circuit vacated, reasoning that the district court may have relied on too stringent an interpretation of the requirement, for an injunction, that the allegedly irreparable harm is being caused by the infringement. The court stated that it could not be confident of the answer to the causation question under the standard properly governing the inquiry or whether there is any independent ground for finding no irreparable harm or otherwise denying an injunction. View "Genband US LLC v. Metaswitch Networks Corp." on Justia Law

IPCom’s 830 patent describes and claims a method and system for handing over a mobile phone call from one base station to another base station. After IPCom sued HTC for infringement, HTC successfully requested that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office conduct inter partes reexamination of claims 1, 5–26, and 28–37. In the first round, the Examiner concluded that the claims were patentable, but the Patent Trial and Appeal Board issued a new ground of rejection for claims 1 and 5–30. In the second round, IPCom amended claims 1, 5–26, and 28–37, but the Board found that these amended claims were obvious under 35 U.S.C. 103 in view of various combinations of prior art. The Federal Circuit concluded, under the circumstances of this case, the Board properly had the authority to consider the patentability of claims 31–37. In its first decision, the Board did not address whether claims 31–37 should be regarded as obvious, but those claims were amended after the first round. The court agreed with IPCom that the Board failed to conduct a proper claim construction of the “arrangement for reactivating the link” claim limitation and vacated the obviousness rejections based on that limitation. View "IPCom GmbH & Co. v. HTC Corp." on Justia Law

AdjustaCam’s patent, which issued in 1999, discloses a camera clip that supports a camera both on a flat surface and when attached to a computer monitor. AdjutaCam’s infringement litigation against Newegg included a Markman order, indicating that AdjustaCam's suit was baseless, and extended expert discovery. Just before summary judgment briefing, AdjustaCam voluntarily dismissed its infringement claims against Newegg with prejudice. Newegg then sought attorneys’ fees under 35 U.S.C. 285. Following a remand in light of intervening Supreme Court precedent clarifying what constitutes an exceptional case, the district court again denied Newegg’s motion for fees. The Federal Circuit reversed. Based on the circumstances presented here, the wholesale reliance on the previous judge’s fact-finding was an abuse of discretion. The record points to this case as standing out from others with respect to the substantive strength of AdjustaCam’s litigating position. Where AdjustaCam may have filed a weak infringement lawsuit, accusing Newegg’s products of infringing the patent, AdjustaCam’s suit became baseless after the district court’s Markman order. View "AdjustaCam, LLC v. Newegg, Inc." on Justia Law

The claims at issue involve testing methods for fetal aneuploidies, conditions in which a fetus either has an abnormally high number of chromosomes (e.g., Down’s syndrome) or an abnormally low number (e.g., Turner’s syndrome). Previously, physicians diagnosed fetal aneuploidies using invasive amniocentesis or chorionic villus sampling or less invasive methods, such as ultrasonography and biochemical marker detection that had suboptimal accuracy. In three interference proceedings between Stanford and Chinese University, the Patent Trial and Appeal Board found that Stanford’s claims were unpatentable for lack of written description. The Federal Circuit vacated, finding that the Board relied on improper evidence and did not cite other substantial evidence to support its key findings. Whether a patent claim satisfies the written description requirement, 35 U.S.C. 112, depends on whether the description clearly allows persons of ordinary skill in the art to recognize that the inventor invented what is claimed. On remand, the Board should examine whether a person of ordinary skill would have understood that the patent’s specification disclosed random MPS sequencing and would have known, as of the priority date, that the specification’s reference to Illumina products meant random MPS sequencing as recited in the claims, by examining the record evidence as to pre-filing date art-related facts on Illumina products. View "Stanford University v. Chinese University of Hong Kong" on Justia Law

The patent, covering methods of treating hepatitis C by administering compounds having a specific chemical and stereochemical structure, issued on a final application filed on June 27, 2003, by the inventor, Storer. In an interference proceeding, Storer was initially declared the senior party based on the “S1” provisional application's June 28, 2002 filing date. Clark’s Application was filed September 12, 2007, with priority claimed to a provisional application filed on May 30, 2003. Both were filed before the effective date of the America Invents Act, which abolished the first-to-invent interference rule in favor of a first-to-file rule. Clark moved to deny Storer the priority date of the S1 application and to invalidate Storer’s claims, arguing that the S1 application did not enable compounds having the 2´F(down) substituent. Storer argued that these compounds were generically disclosed in the S1 application, and were readily obtained based on the disclosure in the S1 provisional and prior art. The Board awarded priority to Clark. The Federal Circuit affirmed; substantial evidence supports the Board’s finding that “a high amount of experimentation is necessary to synthesize” the target compound. The record showed sufficient variability and unpredictability to support a conclusion that Storer’s provisional application did not enable the interference subject matter. View "Storer v. Clark" on Justia Law

Outdry’s 171 patent claims methods of waterproofing leather, particularly for the manufacture of shoes, clothes, or leather accessories. The specification discloses prior art methods of waterproofing leather shoes, including sewing a fabric lining and a semipermeable film to the interior surface of the leather or gluing a semi-permeable membrane inside the leather around the membrane’s perimeter, but states those methods allowed a water cushion to form in which water penetrates the leather and becomes trapped between the membrane and interior surface of the leather. The 171 patent sought to overcome this issue by “directly pressing” a semi-permeable membrane onto the leather via a dotted glue pattern. The Patent Board found that the claims would have been obvious over a combination of prior art. The Federal Circuit affirmed, upholding the Board’s construction of “directly pressing” and finding that a prior reference discloses “directly pressing” and “a process for waterproofing leather.” The Board’s fact finding regarding motivation to combine is supported by substantial evidence. View "Outdry Technologies Corp. v. Geox S.P.A." on Justia Law

When an artery is damaged or inflamed, the body releases the enzyme myeloperoxidase (MPO). Prior art taught that MPO could be detected in an atherosclerotic plaque or lesion that required a surgically invasive method; could be indirectly detected in blood; or could be detected in blood with results that were not predictive of cardiovascular disease. Cleveland Clinic purportedly discovered how to “see” MPO in blood and correlate that to the risk of cardiovascular disease. True Health, a diagnostic laboratory, purchased the assets of Diagnostics, which had contracted with Cleveland Clinic to perform MPO testing. Rather than continue that relationship, True Health performed its own MPO testing. Cleveland Clinic sued, asserting infringement of the patents. The district court found all the claims patent-ineligible under 35 U.S.C. 101; dismissed the contributory and induced infringement claims of the 260 patent; denied leave to amend; and held that it was proper to consider section 101 at the motion to dismiss stage.. The court found that the claims were directed to a law of nature, with no saving inventive concept. The Federal Circuit affirmed. Cleveland Clinic provided no proposed construction of any terms or proposed expert testimony that would change the analysis. The claims, whether considered limitation-by-limitation or as a whole, do not sufficiently transform the natural existence of MPO in a bodily sample and its correlation to cardiovascular risk into a patentable invention. View "Cleveland Clinic Foundation v. True Health Diagnostics. LLC" on Justia Law

EmeraChem’s 758 patent claims methods for regenerating a devitalized catalyst/absorber that has absorbed and oxidized nitrates and nitrites after exposure to pollutants in the combustion gases of engines by passing a regeneration gas over the catalyst without removing the catalyst. The application was filed in 1994; the patent issued in 1997, naming Guth and Campbell as co-inventors. The 758 patent incorporates Campbell 558 in its entirety. The application for Campbell 558 was filed months before the 758 application; the patent issued in 1995, disclosing a catalyst/absorber used to absorb and oxidize pollutants from exhaust gas but requiring removal of the catalyst/absorber. Campbell, Danziger, Guth, and Padron are its named co-inventors. Volkswagen sought inter partes review of the 758 patent, alleging anticipation of various claims and that various claims would have been obvious under 35 U.S.C. 103(a) over the combination of Campbell 558 and a prior reference. The Patent Board found that certain claims of the 758 patent would have been obvious over Campbell and another reference. The Federal Circuit affirmed as to several claims and vacated with respect to others. Campbell’s Declaration was insufficient to demonstrate that the cited portions of Campbell are not “by another.” The Board did not err in holding Campbell is section 102(e) prior art. The court remanded for clarification of whether the Board adopted a new rationale for unpatentability in its final written decision. View "EmeraChem Holdings, LLC v. Volkswagen Group of America, Inc." on Justia Law

One-E-Way filed a complaint with the International Trade Commission, alleging infringement of its patents, which disclose a wireless digital audio system designed to let people use wireless headphones privately, without interference, even when multiple people are using wireless headphones in the same space. The specification explains that previous wireless digital audio systems did not provide “private listening without interference where multiple users occupying the same space are operating wireless transmission devices.” The Commission found the claim term “virtually free from interference” indefinite and invalidated the asserted claims of One-E-Way’s patents. The Federal Circuit reversed, finding that the term “virtually free from interference,” as properly interpreted in light of the specification and prosecution history, would inform a person of ordinary skill in the art about the scope of the invention with reasonable certainty. View "One-E-Way, Inc. v. International Trade Commission" on Justia Law