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Full-Text Articles in Law
The Federal Question In Patent-License Cases, Amelia Smith Rinehart
The Federal Question In Patent-License Cases, Amelia Smith Rinehart
Indiana Law Journal
The patent law has long recognized a patent owner’s ability to license some interest in the patent by granting to others permission to tread upon the patent owner’s property rights without legal consequence. When one of the parties to a patent license decides to seek remedies from the other party for a license harm, the resulting litigation may be a patent-infringement case with a contract issue or a contract case with a patent issue. In most cases, the patent owner brings her suit against the licensee in federal court, alleging that the licensee breached the license contract and, as a …
Retroactivity At The Federal Circuit, David L. Schwartz
Retroactivity At The Federal Circuit, David L. Schwartz
Indiana Law Journal
A substantial subset of patent opinions from the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals functions in a wholly different manner from ordinary judicial opinions: they have strong retroactive effects with weak prospective effects. All Federal Circuit opinions have strong retroactive effects because issued patents and pending applications rarely can be modified. The Federal Circuit decisions apply in full to these patents and applications, even though they were prepared without the benefit of the rulings. In contrast, many of these opinions have almost no prospective effects. Patent law provides tremendous linguistic flexibility to patent drafters, which can be used to avoid the …
Patents, Presumptions, And Public Notice, Timothy R. Holbrook
Patents, Presumptions, And Public Notice, Timothy R. Holbrook
Indiana Law Journal
Patents are peculiar legal instruments in that they contain both technical and legal information. This Janus-like nature of the documents is important because they serve the legal purpose of affording the owner the right to exclude others from practicing the invention, and third parties need to be able to assess the scope of that right. At the same time, through the patent’s disclosure, the document is intended to contribute to the storehouse of technical knowledge. Superficially, patents are generally viewed through the eyes of the hypothetical person having ordinary skill in the art (PHOSITA), patent law’s “reasonable person.” Unfortunately, the …