In order to qualify as an inventor on a U.S. patent, a person must contribute to the conception of the invention as embodied in one or more of the claims—merely building or implementing the already-conceived technology is not enough. And, the failure to include every actual inventor invalidates the subject patent. In a recent case … Continue Reading
Judge Stearns recently clarified the scope of an almost five-year-old multi-district patent dispute in the District of Massachusetts. Since early 2013, Judge Stearns has presided over NeuroGrafix’ allegations of patent infringement after ten actions encompassing dozens of defendants were consolidated in the District of Massachusetts. In the suit relevant to Judge Stearns’ most recent order, … Continue Reading
A recent decision from Judge Stearns sheds new light on a dispute between Lexington Luminance (“Lexington”) and Google over LED technology. The dispute began in November, 2012, when Lexington accused Google of infringing U.S. Patent No. 6,936,851 (the “’851 Patent”), entitled “Semiconductor Light-Emitting Device and Method for Manufacturing Same.” In particular, Lexington accused the LEDs … Continue Reading
A Massachusetts court recently denied defendant Kaz’s motions for judgment on the defenses of laches and equitable estoppel, letting stand an earlier jury verdict that found Kaz had infringed Exergen’s patents for temporal thermometers. As we previously reported, the verdict awarded the plaintiff almost $15 million in damages.… Continue Reading
In a long-running patent fight involving two medical device manufacturers, a Massachusetts jury determined last week that the defendant Kaz had infringed two of plaintiff Exergen’s patents relating to temporal thermometers, and that the patents are not invalid. The jury also awarded Exergen nearly $15 million in damages.… Continue Reading
Although courts and commentators have turned up the heat on the entire market value rule (EMVR) in recent years, it can be a useful tool for a patentee to obtain significant damages where the evidence shows that the patented feature is the basis of consumer demand for the accused product. Thus, defendants often try to … Continue Reading
In a significant recent opinion, Judge Richard G. Stearns carefully considered the complex doctrine of issue preclusion, and applied it to a case involving section 101 patentability analyses. The opinion provides helpful clarity on when claim preclusion applies.… Continue Reading
In a recent decision out of the District of Massachusetts, Judge Stearns assessed Kaz’s inequitable conduct defense on summary judgment – and found it to come up short by a degree. The opinion is an important reminder that to make out an inequitable conduct defense, a litigant must make a strong showing as to both … Continue Reading
In a recent District of Massachusetts case, a defendant attempted to use the crucible of summary judgment to invalidate the plaintiff’s body temperature detection patents. But, as shown in the Court’s ruling, sometimes that strategy does not produce the desired results.… Continue Reading
Last week, a federal jury in Massachusetts delivered a verdict in favor of patent-defendant Adobe Systems, invalidating all asserted claims of EveryScape’s two asserted patents. Earlier in the litigation, the court found at summary judgment that a tool in the Vanishing Point filter of Adobe’s popular Photoshop software directly infringed EveryScape’s patents. So at trial, Adobe … Continue Reading
Shonda Rhimes, executive producer of the hit television shows Greys Anatomy, Scandal, and How to Get Away with Murder, is one of Hollywood’s most sought after talents. But in what is one of the most colorful New England opinions we have covered on this blog, it appears that the District of Massachusetts was not quite … Continue Reading
How do you defend yourself against charges of willful patent infringement? Companies finding themselves facing such an allegation often use the defense that they relied on a pre-lawsuit opinion from a lawyer that the company does not infringe valid patents. Such an opinion, if it exists, can be a strong piece of defensive evidence, because … Continue Reading
Presiding over separate but related patent infringement suits against tech-industry giants can be neither straightforward nor efficient. The limits of judicial efficiency are further exacerbated when lawsuits involving the same patents are assigned to two or more judges, as each judge must separately construe the terms of the patents. Addressing this problem, Judges Young and … Continue Reading