Evidentiary, My Dear Watson; Biosig, Instruments v. Nautilus, Inc.

Posted on August 1, 2013 by Warren Woessner

This is a guest post from Ronald Schutz of Robins, Kaplan, Miller & Ciresi.

In Biosig, Instruments v. Nautilus, Inc., a unanimous panel of the Federal Circuit had little trouble deducing the definiteness of the patent at issue despite a lower court finding it “insolubly ambiguous.” Using both intrinsic and extrinsic evidence, the Biosig court found the patent term “spaced relationship” amenable to construction —and thus an improbable suspect for summary judgment on indefiniteness grounds.

The entire post can be found here: APaTS Evidentiary My Dear Watson.

 

 

 

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Complimentary Webinar: Patenting DNA

Posted on July 25, 2013 by Warren Woessner

Join Robin Chadwick and me as we untangle the web of rulings in the upcoming webinar “Patenting DNA: Why DNA is Different and What to Do About It.”  The live CLE webinar will be presented on Wednesday, August 7th at 12 PM (CDT).  For more information and to register, click here.

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Bosch, Ultramercial, Commil, Fresenius: All-Star Break

Posted on July 23, 2013 by Warren Woessner

A guest post from Ron Schutz of Robins, Kaplan, Miller & Ciresi

The Federal Circuit goes into the symbolic half-way point of summer leading the league with a series of homerun opinions. To keep the games back gap on updates from widening, consider the following take on a Midsummer Classic.

Bosch v. Pylon In Bosch, the Federal Circuit considered en banc two questions regarding the extent of its appellate jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1292(c)(2). That statute authorizes an interlocutory appeal from a judgment in a patent infringement judgment action that is “final except for an accounting.” Sua sponte, the court asked whether § 1292(c)(2) confers jurisdiction for an appeal of patent infringement liability before a trial on damages has occurred and whether that jurisdiction exists when willfulness issues remain undecided.

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Senator Leahy Urges NIH to Exercise “March-in” Rights on Myriad’s Tests

Posted on July 17, 2013 by Warren Woessner

The Bayh-Dole Act of 1980 grants universities the right to elect to take title in any patent application and patent that was made by their researchers with the support of the Government, e.g., NIH. 35 USC s. 200 et seq. This clears the path for universities and other non-profit institutions to license the patents, potentially exclusively, to commercial entities (like big Pharma) that, hopefully will fund further research and eventually bring a drug to market. Prior to 1980, the Government kept title, and was responsible for licensing such technology. However, due to a lack of resources and red tape, most Government-funded inventions never saw “the light of day.”

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