Law Commons^™

Patent Claim Apportionment, Patentee Injury And Sequential Invention, Amy L. Landers

Amy L Landers

Reasonable royalty compensation for patent infringement is the most popular form of recovery and becomes more so every year. This may be based on the unfortunate but accurate perception that patentees can win big using the overly malleable legal standards that now govern such awards. One of the most glaring shortcomings of the standard is that it permits an award of a reasonable royalty based on doctrine that has lost touch with its statutory purpose.

This article sets forth a theory of patentee injury to establish a causative link between the inventive contribution and the reasonable royalty award. After doing …

Patent Valuation Theory And The Economics Of Improvement, Amy L. Landers

Amy L Landers

In her response to Professor Golden's Principles of Patent Remedies, Professor Landers identifies three threads that underlie the debate on patent remedies. First, patent value may be difficult to define because of certain indeterminacies. Second, economic and technological contingencies may distort the amounts paid for patents. Third, principles of adaptation and implementation might bring the field to a theoretical consensus about patent value. After analyzing Prof. Golden’s principles in the context of each thread, Prof. Landers proposes that, in order to bridge the differences in current theoretical viewpoints, the explicit addition of the economics of improvement is necessary.

Ordinary Creativity In Patent Law: The Artist Within The Scientist, Amy L. Landers

Amy L Landers

Patent law is intended to promote the creativity of scientists and engi-neers. The system recognizes that the work of the individual is the engine that ultimately increases the state of scientific knowledge. As economist Paul Romer recognized, “Technological advance comes from things that people do.” Furthering creativity represents the constitutional, theoretical and doc-trinal heart of patent law. Yet the field has not meaningfully evaluated the fundamental question of what creativity is. Using theories from psychology, sociology, history and the philosophy of science, this work examines and pro-poses how patent law can formulate a legal conception of creativity.

To undertake this …

Let The Games Begin: Incentives To Innovation In The New Economy Of Intellectual Property Law, Amy L. Landers

Amy L Landers

Patent litigation is developing a troubling resemblance to a Las Vegas casino. Juries have awarded patentees damage amounts that far exceed the value of a patented invention. At the same time, courts have failed to define standards to align damages with the patentee’s harm. As a result, the damages awarded for patent infringement far exceed the amount that the patent is worth. These circumstances create incentives for patentees to “game” the patent system by seeking large damages and settlement jackpots from those accused of infringement. Increasingly, so-called “patent trolls” assert patent infringement allegations, seeking to turn ideas into cold hard …

Liquid Patents, Amy L. Landers

Amy L Landers

The current patent system is argued to be in a state of crisis. Although much recent criticism about the patent system has been leveled at so-called “patent trolls,” another trend has emerged that may prove more enduring and potentially more troublesome. Patent holders have developed more systematized and strategic methods to obtain revenues from the patent system, building business plans around leveraging monetary value. Recognizing that the patent right can be monetized into licensing fees and damages in an action for patent infringement, some entities have undertaken formalized programs to gather or acquire critical patents in particular fields. These practices …