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Intellectual Property Law Commons

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Articles 1 - 9 of 9

Full-Text Articles in Intellectual Property Law

Ip Injury And The Institutions Of Patent Law, Paul Gugliuzza Jan 2013

Ip Injury And The Institutions Of Patent Law, Paul Gugliuzza

Faculty Scholarship

This paper reviews Creation Without Restraint: Promoting Liberty and Rivalry in Innovation, the pathbreaking book by Christina Bohannan and Herbert Hovenkamp (Oxford Univ. Press 2012). The Review begins by summarizing the book’s descriptive insights and analyzing one of its important normative proposals: the adoption of an IP injury requirement. This requirement would demand that infringement plaintiffs prove -- before obtaining damages or an injunction -- an injury to the incentive to innovate. After explaining how this requirement is easy to justify under governing law and is largely consistent with recent Supreme Court decisions in the field of patent law, the …


Wisdom Of The Ages Or Dead-Hand Control? Patentable Subject Matter For Diagnostic Methods After In Re Bilski, Rebecca S. Eisenberg Jan 2012

Wisdom Of The Ages Or Dead-Hand Control? Patentable Subject Matter For Diagnostic Methods After In Re Bilski, Rebecca S. Eisenberg

Articles

In 1980, the Supreme Court gave a reassuring signal to the then-nascent biotechnology industry about the availability of patent protection for the fruits of its research when it upheld the patentability of a genetically modified living organism in Diamond v. Chakrabarty. Twenty-five years later, the Court seemed poised to reexamine the limits of patentable subject matter for advances in the life sciences when it granted certiorari in Laboratory Corporation v. Metabolite. But the Federal Circuit had not addressed the patentable subject matter issue in Laboratory Corporation, and the Court ultimately dismissed the certiorari p etition as improvidently granted. Five years …


The Claim Construction Effect, Lee Petherbridge Jan 2008

The Claim Construction Effect, Lee Petherbridge

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

Claim construction refers to the task of construing, or interpreting, the words of patents' claims to establish the metes and bounds of a patent. Theoretically, the task of claim construction serves to operationalize the concept of "invention," which lies at the heart of the U.S. patent system.[...] Rather than focusing on the set of cases in which the Federal Circuit addresses claim construction, this study focuses on a set of cases defined by a different patent doctrine. The basic idea is to explore the impact of claim construction on other areas of patent law.[...] The hypothesis of the claim construction …


Research Tool Patents After Integra V. Merck - Have They Reached A Safe Harbor, Wolrad Prinz Jan 2008

Research Tool Patents After Integra V. Merck - Have They Reached A Safe Harbor, Wolrad Prinz

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

The saga surrounding the Integra v. Merck cases has rekindled a heated debate about the proper scope of both common law exemption and the safe harbor provision, causing significant concern for owners of research tool patents. This Article will argue that the next judicial decision addressing the question of research tool patents should clarify that they are in a safe harbor because none of the two exemptions from infringement referenced above extends to the use of research tools in experiments in order to preserve the necessary incentives for their creation in the first place. Allowing access to research tools under …


Making Sense Of Ksr And Other Recent Patent Cases, Harold C. Wegner Jan 2007

Making Sense Of Ksr And Other Recent Patent Cases, Harold C. Wegner

Michigan Law Review First Impressions

The recent Supreme Court review of KSR International Inc. v. Teleflex Inc., eBay Inc. v. MercExchange LLC, and Microsoft Corp. v. AT&T Corp. manifests the Court’s current interest in the patent jurisprudence of the Fed-eral Circuit. Now it is evident that the Court has a level of concern sufficient to guarantee the possibility of grant of certiorari—whereas formerly a case could rarely generate sufficient interest for review. For long-range impor-tance in patent law, KSR stands alone as the single most important Supreme Court patent decision on the bread and butter standard of “obviousness” in the more than forty years since …


Ksr's Effect On Patent Law, Stephen G. Kunin, Andrew K. Beverina Jan 2007

Ksr's Effect On Patent Law, Stephen G. Kunin, Andrew K. Beverina

Michigan Law Review First Impressions

The Supreme Court in KSR International Co. v. Teleflex Inc. clarified its 1966 decision in Graham v. John Deere, avoiding the sea change to a synergy- based standard that many had expected—and perhaps feared. KSR has raised the bar set in Graham for seeking patent protection—by providing a flexible test for obviousness—while simultaneously making it easier for accused infringers to defend themselves. Moreover, KSR will change the strategies of both patent prosecutors and litigators. Before KSR, the Supreme Court’s last major decision on nonobviousness under 35 U.S.C. § 103 was Graham, in which the Court established three factual inquiries for …


What Is Hiding In The Bushes - Ebay's Effect On Holdout Behavior In Patent Thickets, Gavin D. George Jan 2007

What Is Hiding In The Bushes - Ebay's Effect On Holdout Behavior In Patent Thickets, Gavin D. George

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

Importantly, at least a few relevant patent holders are inevitably left out of an industry organization's collection of patents. These left-out patent holders, known as "holdouts," can undermine the collective arrangement with demand letters and infringement suits.[...] The first part of this Note explains why holdouts exist in the first place, given the benefits of joining an organization of collected patents. In the second part of this Note, I explore the lack of legal protections against holdout demands offered by pre-eBay patent law. The third part of this Note introduces the eBay decision as revolutionary addition to list of legal …


Ksr V. Teleflex: Predictable Reform Of Patent Substance And Procedure In The Judiciary, John F. Duffy Jan 2007

Ksr V. Teleflex: Predictable Reform Of Patent Substance And Procedure In The Judiciary, John F. Duffy

Michigan Law Review First Impressions

Though KSR International Co. v. Teleflex, Inc. is now widely acknowl-edged in the bar and the academy to be the most significant patent case in at least a quarter century, that view dramatically underestimates the impor-tance of the decision. The KSR decision has immense significance not merely because it rejected the standard of patentability that had been applied in the lower courts for decades, but also because it highlights many separate trends that are reshaping the patent system. This Commentary will touch upon four such trends that are clearly evi-dent in KSR. First, the case was a predictable continuation of …


The Supreme Court And The Federal Circuit: Visitation And Custody Of Patent Law, Rebecca S. Eisenberg Jan 2007

The Supreme Court And The Federal Circuit: Visitation And Custody Of Patent Law, Rebecca S. Eisenberg

Articles

The U.S. Supreme Court’s relationship to patent law sometimes seems like that of a non-custodial parent who spends an occasional weekend with the kids. The custodial parent is, of course, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. The Federal Courts Improvement Act of 1982 consolidated intermediate appellate jurisdiction over patent law cases in this single court, which hears appeals from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (“PTO”), the U.S. District Courts, the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, and the U.S. In-ternational Trade Commission. Day to day it is the Federal Circuit that reviews contested decisions of the institutions …