Antitrust and Trade Regulation Commons^™

A Machete For The Patent Thicket: Using Noerr-Pennington Doctrine’S Sham Exception To Challenge Abusive Patent Tactics By Pharmaceutical Companies, Lisa Orucevic

Vanderbilt Law Review

Outrageous drug prices have dominated news coverage of the American healthcare system for years. Yet despite widespread condemnation of skyrocketing drug prices, nothing seems to change. Pharmaceutical companies can raise drug prices with impunity because they hold patents on their drugs, which give them monopolies. These monopolies are only supposed to last twenty years, and then competing lower-cost drugs like generics can enter the market, driving down the costs of pharmaceuticals for all. But pharmaceutical companies have created “patent thickets,” dense webs of overlapping patents surrounding one drug, which have artificially extended the companies’ monopolies for years or even decades …

Franchise Participants As Proper Patent Opponents: Walker Process Claims, Robert W. Emerson

Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment & Technology Law

Franchise parties may be sued for patent infringement, or they may seek to sue others for an antitrust injury as the result of a fraudulently obtained patent. Indeed, franchisors and franchisees may simultaneously fall under both categories-sued for infringement but aggrieved because the very basis of that suit is illegitimate in their eyes. These franchise parties may turn for relief to a patent-validity challenge authorized in the seminal case Walker Process Equipment, Inc. v. Food Machine & Chemical Corp. Franchise participants-franchisees and franchisors alike-may be the ideal Walker Process claimants. When these types of cases occur, the damages within the …

Entering The Innovation Twilight Zone: How Patent And Antitrust Law Must Work Together, Jeffrey I.D. Lewis, Maggie Wittlin

Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment & Technology Law

Patent law and antitrust law have traded ascendancy over the last century, as courts and other institutions have tended to favor one at the expense of the other. In this Article, we take several steps toward stabilizing the doctrine surrounding these two branches of law. First, we argue that an optimal balance between patent rights and antitrust enforcement exists that will maximize consumer welfare, including promoting innovation and economic growth. Further, as Congress is the best institution to find this optimum, courts should enforce both statutes according to their literal text, which grants absolute patent rights but allows for more …

Trolling For Standards: How Courts And The Administrative State Can Help Deter Patent Holdup And Promote Innovation, Niels J. Melius

Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment & Technology Law

Antitrust law and patent law share the common goal of improving economic welfare by facilitating competition and innovation. But these legal fields conflict when baseless claims of patent infringement disrupt the competitive process. In its eBay decision, the Supreme Court muddied the precedential waters by promulgating a vague doctrine of injunctive relief in patent infringement cases. In the years since, a split has emerged in the district courts on the question of which entities generally qualify for injunctive relief as an additional remedy to damages. This uncertainty has failed to mitigate an antitrust phenomenon known as "patent holdup," whereby an …

Case Digest, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

Agency for International Development's Adoption of Policy Placing Abortion-Related Restrictions on Grants to Nongovernmental Organizations Upheld DKT Memorial Fund Ltd. v. Agency for International Development 887 F.2d 275 (D.C. Cir.1989)

Federal Long-Arm Statute Authorizes Assertion of Personal Jurisdiction over Foreign Holder of United States Patent in Patent Ownership Suit National Patent Development Corporation v. T.J. Smith & Nephew Ltd. 877 F.2d 1003 (D.C. Cir.1989) (en banc)

Venue over Alien Defendants in Antitrust Suit Proper in any United States Federal District Court under Alien Venue AcT-Go-Video, Inc. v. Akai Electric Co., Ltd. 885 F.2d 1406(9th Cir. 1989)

INS Oral Notice to …

Book Review, Joel Davidow (Reviewer)

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

Book Review

Antitrust and American Business Abroad James Atwood and Kingman Brewster 2d ed. New York: McGraw-Hill Publishing Co., 1981. Two-volume text. Pp. 359 and 355.

Reviewed by Joel Davidow

International antitrust is one of the gourmet specialties on the menu of United States law. The combination of competition law, international law, and patent law, spiced with complex diplomatic and trade issues as well as a dash of foreign flavor, is irresistible to the connoisseur. The proof: even though few law schools offer a separate course in international antitrust law and few lawyers deal with the subject regularly, articles, hornbooks, …

Bibliography: The Extraterritorial Application Of United States Antitrust Laws: A Selective Bibliography, Howard A. Hood

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

Those who have commented on the Webb-Pomerene Act can be divided into two groups: (1) those who support the Act and would retain it or even expand its scope; and (2) those who oppose the Act and would repeal or weaken it. The first group believes that application of the antitrust laws to the foreign activities of United States companies impairs their ability to compete in the world market. The second group rejects this contention and considers the Webb-Pomerene Act to be unjustifiably inconsistent with the legal framework of free competition...

This bibliography presents selected citations to the literature of …

Recent Decisions, Robert S. Patterson, George M. Taylor, Iii

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

The instant decision is an evolutionary step in the development of extraterritorial antitrust but it falls short of establishing a workable standard. What the decision does point out is that the courts lack the experience and expertise necessary to deal effectively with the application of antitrust laws abroad. This inexperience will further erode the consistent application of United States antitrust laws abroad as the courts begin to hear cases involving less obvious offenses and less significant effects on United States commerce." If, as Sabbatino suggests,' the primary competency of the Executive in foreign affairs is to be the major factor …

Recent Cases, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

Antitrust--Horizontal Territorial Restraint--Allocation of Territories Among Members of Cooperative Purchasing Association Is Per Se Violative of Section 1 of the Sherman Act

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Antitrust--Robinson--Patman Price Discrimination Act--Complaint Charging That Profits Derived from Interstate Sales Were Used To Underwrite Allegedly Discriminatory Intrastate Price-Cutting Practices States a Cause of Action Under Section 2(a)

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Bankruptcy--Corporate Reorganization-Trustee in Reorganization Lacks Standing To Sue Indenture Trustee on Behalf of Debenture Holders

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Constitutional Law--Commerce Clause--Exactions on Airport Users by Local Governments Measured by Number of Enplaning Passengers Are Constitutionally Valid

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Constitutional Law--Right to Speedy Trial--State-Imposed Five-Year Delay Does Not Abridge Right to Speedy …