Intellectual Property

  • December 05, 2024

    DOJ Is Eyeing Foreign Patent Litigation Funding, GAO Says

    The U.S. Department of Justice is examining the role foreign countries might be playing in funding patent litigation in the U.S., the Government Accountability Office said in a report released Thursday exploring the benefits and pitfalls of the proliferation of third-party intellectual property litigation financing.

  • December 05, 2024

    Gov't Efficiency Push Is A 'New Day,' House Speaker Says

    House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., spoke excitedly Thursday about the new government efficiency operation helmed by billionaire Elon Musk and former presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy and touted the budding bipartisan lineup of a congressional caucus that will work with it.

  • December 05, 2024

    Judge Snubs Bid For $1M Bond On $22M 'Comfy' IP Verdict

    An Arizona federal judge on Wednesday rejected a retailer's bid to pay a $1 million bond while appealing a $22 million judgment against it for infringing the design patents of Cozy Comfort Co., the maker of the "Comfy" sweatshirt featured on "Shark Tank."

  • December 05, 2024

    Sanctioned VLSI Patent Challenger Must ID Members In Va.

    VLSI Technology LLC won a major victory Thursday in litigation where it's looking for compensation from a mysterious company it claims tried to "extort" it at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, with a Virginia federal judge ordering that company to disclose its members.

  • December 05, 2024

    Infringing Phone Mounts Permanently Blocked In Patent Case

    A Washington federal judge agreed on Thursday to block a maker of electronic device mounts from selling certain products that have infringed a patent owned by a rival.

  • December 05, 2024

    Face-Swapping App Can't Ax Reality TV Star's Suit At 9th Circ.

    The Ninth Circuit on Thursday refused to toss a reality TV star's proposed class action accusing a face-swapping app of misusing his likeness, finding his statutory right-of-publicity claim isn't preempted by the federal Copyright Act since the claim involves his likeness and "not a work of authorship."

  • December 05, 2024

    NCAA's NIL Settlement 'Illegal' In Many States, Lawmakers Say

    The National Collegiate Athletic Association's $2.78 billion settlement with athletes over name, image and likeness compensation, now awaiting final court approval, would be "illegal" in several states because of their current NIL laws, a group of current and former lawmakers said Thursday.

  • December 05, 2024

    Fed. Circ. Unlikely To Help Realtek Pursue ITC Sanctions

    A Federal Circuit panel seemed baffled Thursday as a K&L Gates attorney argued that the U.S. International Trade Commission wrongly stopped his client from pursuing sanctions, with the panel repeatedly noting that the semiconductor company wasn't even a party in the import dispute.

  • December 05, 2024

    9th Circ. Skeptical Starz Ripped Off Play For Strip Club Drama

    A Ninth Circuit panel appeared dubious Thursday of a playwright's bid to revive claims that Starz Entertainment copied her stage musical for the strip club drama series "P-Valley," with one of the appellate judges noting that the works "could not be more different."

  • December 05, 2024

    PrizePicks Faces Second Claim Of Fantasy Platform Ripoff

    Atlanta-based sports betting platform PrizePicks has been hit with a second lawsuit in as many years from business-to-business sports tech company Vetnos, claiming Wednesday that PrizePicks ripped off its concept of daily fantasy betting games with the help of a former Vetnos employee.

  • December 05, 2024

    Skadden Adds A&O Shearman IP Litigator In Silicon Valley

    Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom LLP continues expanding its technology team, announcing Thursday it has brought in an Allen Overy Shearman Sterling intellectual property litigator as a partner in its Silicon Valley office.

  • December 05, 2024

    Fed. Circ. Backs Mixed PTAB Ruling In Circuit Patent Fight

    The Federal Circuit on Thursday affirmed the Patent Trial and Appeal Board's finding that Dutch semiconductor maker NXP was able to show that some claims in a pair of Bell Semiconductor circuit patents were invalid but was unable to prove other claims were unpatentable.

  • December 05, 2024

    Insulet Wins $452M In Trade Secret Theft Trial

    A Massachusetts federal jury has awarded Insulet Corp. $452 million after concluding that a South Korean company stole its trade secrets for a wearable insulin patch pump, marking one of the largest trade secrets verdicts of the decade.

  • December 04, 2024

    Withers IP Partners Hop To Sullivan & Worcester

    Sullivan & Worcester LLP has said the Boston firm picked up a team of five intellectual property lawyers, including two partners, from Withers who have expertise in filing patents and working on deals for biotech startups. 

  • December 04, 2024

    Intel, VLSI Agree To Pause Del. IP Fight Ahead Of Texas Trial

    Prodded by a federal judge in Delaware, Intel Corp. and VLSI Technology LLC agreed Wednesday to stay motions to dismiss or transfer an Intel Corp. suit over claims that it already holds licenses to patents that VLSI asserts it controls, as a similar patent battle moves forward in Texas.

  • December 04, 2024

    Fed. Circ. Sinks Patent Fight Over Intel's CPU Chips

    The Federal Circuit on Wednesday rubber-stamped a ruling out of Delaware federal court that cleared Intel of allegations that the chipmaker infringed patents by a University of Maryland professor who purportedly developed an important idea in the world of "parallel computing" in 2006.

  • December 04, 2024

    Novartis Fails To Stop Generic Drug Release At Fed. Circ.

    Novartis could not persuade Federal Circuit judges to grant an injunction Wednesday protecting its blockbuster heart failure medication from facing generic competition, with the appeals court backing a Delaware federal judge's opinion that it was unlikely that one of the generic drug's ingredients is "amorphous."

  • December 04, 2024

    JSR Wins As Fed. Circ. Axes Cytiva Antibody Isolation Patents

    In a precedential opinion, the Federal Circuit held Wednesday that all the claims that JSR Corp. challenged in three Cytiva Bioprocess antibody isolation patents are invalid as obvious, backing the Patent Trial and Appeal Board's invalidation of many claims while reversing its decision to uphold others.

  • December 04, 2024

    Meta Persuades PTAB To Ax 2 Earphone Patents

    The Patent Trial and Appeal Board has found that Meta was able to show that every claim in a pair of earphone patents owned by Eight kHz is invalid, holding they are obvious.

  • December 04, 2024

    Fed. Circ. Sends UC System LED Patent Claims Back To PTAB

    The Federal Circuit on Wednesday found that the Patent Trial and Appeal Board has to partially rethink its finding that claims in a filament LED light bulb patent owned by the University of California system were too obvious to warrant patent protection.

  • December 04, 2024

    Penn State Eyes Ban, Atty Fees After Trial Win Against Retailer

    The Pennsylvania State University has asked a federal court in the Keystone State to permanently block an online retailer and its owner from selling merchandise that a jury found infringed the university's trademarks, and said it is entitled to attorney fees from the "serial infringers."

  • December 04, 2024

    Fleetwood Mac Producer, Playwright Settle IP Dispute

    A producer of the 1977 Fleetwood Mac album "Rumours" and the author of the play "Stereophonic" have resolved claims that the Broadway show infringed copyrighted material from a memoir about making the record, according to a filing in New York federal court.

  • December 04, 2024

    Amazon, Stanley Tumbler Maker Sue Alleged Counterfeiters

    Amazon and the maker of the popular "Stanley" tumbler are suing several marketplace vendors in Washington federal court, accusing them of peddling counterfeit drink ware in the e-commerce platform's latest legal push to crack down on brand-stealing sellers.

  • December 04, 2024

    Ace Hardware Looks To Nail Screw-Selling Rival Over TM Use

    Ace Hardware Corp. said Tuesday that a home improvement chain sharing the Ace name is watering down its decades of name recognition and goodwill while creeping in on Ace's turf and leading confused consumers astray.

  • December 04, 2024

    Fed. Circ. Judge Condemns 'Nonsense' Law In Antibody Fight

    U.S. Circuit Judge Todd Hughes called the Federal Circuit's case law on interpreting preambles in patent claims "nonsense" on Wednesday, expressing frustration as a panel tried to work through whether Xencor Inc.'s antibody patent application was too broad.

Expert Analysis

  • Primer On Chinese Trade Secret Disputes For US Practitioners

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    Increasing cross-border disputes over trade secret misappropriation between U.S. and Chinese entities emphasize the need for U.S. practitioners to navigate China's legal landscape following recent reforms that enhance the viability of litigation in Chinese courts, say attorneys at Jones Day.

  • Mental Health First Aid: A Brief Primer For Attorneys

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    Amid a growing body of research finding that attorneys face higher rates of mental illness than the general population, firms should consider setting up mental health first aid training programs to help lawyers assess mental health challenges in their colleagues and intervene with compassion, say psychologists Shawn Healy and Tracey Meyers.

  • Licensing And Protections For Voice Actors In The Age Of AI

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    While two recently enacted California laws and other recent state and federal legislation largely focus on protecting actors and musicians from the unauthorized use of their digital likenesses by generative artificial intelligence systems, the lesser-known community of professional voice actors also stands to benefit, says attorney Scott Mortman.

  • Opinion

    Failure To Use Apportionment Has Distorted Patent Damages

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    Apportionment is the solution to the problem of inflated patent infringement damages, and courts should return to focusing on the smallest saleable unit as the starting point for apportionment analysis, say William Lee at WilmerHale and Mark Lemley at Stanford Law School.

  • Series

    Collecting Art Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    The therapeutic aspects of appreciating and collecting art improve my legal practice by enhancing my observation skills, empathy, creativity and cultural awareness, says attorney Michael McCready.

  • Takeaways From Novo Nordisk's Fight For Market Exclusivity

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    Generic competitors’ challenge to Novo Nordisk’s patents in hopes of capturing a portion of the rapidly expanding Type 2 diabetes and obesity treatment market highlights the role of abbreviated new drug application litigation, inter partes review and multidistrict litigation in patent defense, says Pedram Sameni at Patexia.

  • Using Primacy And Recency Effects In Opening Statements

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    By understanding and strategically employing the primacy and recency effects in opening statements, attorneys can significantly enhance their persuasive impact, ensuring that their narrative is both compelling and memorable from the outset, says Bill Kanasky at Courtroom Sciences.

  • Opinion

    Bill Is Key To Protecting US Economy From Patent Piracy

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    It is critical that Congress pass a recently introduced bill that would protect U.S. investors from intellectual property theft by restoring court-ordered injunctions as the default remedy in patent infringement cases to ensure inventors get the justice they deserve, says Andrei Iancu at Sullivan & Cromwell.

  • Defending AI, Machine Learning Patents In Life Sciences

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    Ten years after the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Alice v. CLS Bank, artificial intelligence and machine learning technology remain at risk for Alice challenges, but reviewing recent cases can help life sciences companies avoid common pitfalls and successfully defend their patents, say attorneys at Mintz.

  • Litigation Inspiration: Honoring Your Learned Profession

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    About 30,000 people who took the bar exam in July will learn they passed this fall, marking a fitting time for all attorneys to remember that they are members in a specialty club of learned professionals — and the more they can keep this in mind, the more benefits they will see, says Bennett Rawicki at Hilgers Graben.

  • From Concept To Capital: 5 Stages Of Evolving IP Needs

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    Companies must understand the shifting intellectual property needs throughout an organization’s life cycle in order to protect innovation, which can be done by fortifying the IP portfolio, expanding and leveraging IP assets, and more, says Keegan Caldwell at Caldwell Law.

  • Allergan Ruling Reinforces Value Of Patent Term Adjustments

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    The Federal Circuit’s recent ruling in Allergan v. MSN, which held that patent term adjustment awards for first-filed, first-issued patents cannot be stripped away by later-issuing child patents that expire earlier, means practitioners must consider the potential impact of any action that might reduce the adjustment amount, say attorneys at Cooley.

  • Opinion

    AI May Limit Key Learning Opportunities For Young Attorneys

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    The thing that’s so powerful about artificial intelligence is also what’s most scary about it — its ability to detect patterns may curtail young attorneys’ chance to practice the lower-level work of managing cases, preventing them from ever honing the pattern recognition skills that undergird creative lawyering, says Sarah Murray at Trialcraft.

  • A Look At How De Minimis Import Rules May Soon Change

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    The planned implementation of executive actions focused on the de minimis rule as it applies to shipments means companies should use this interval to evaluate the potential applicability and impact of Section 301, Section 201 or Section 232 duties on their products, say attorneys at Holland & Knight.

  • How To Craft Strong Prong 2 Arguments For AI Patent Apps

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    The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office’s recent guidance update on subject matter eligibility for artificial intelligence inventions highlights that the key to overcoming rejection lies in the analysis under Prong 2, which practitioners should consider leading their arguments with, says Sean Lee at Baker Botts.

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