HYATT v. HIRSHFELD

Before Moore, Reyna, and Hughes. Appeals from the United States District Court for the District of Columbia.

Summary: The phrase “[a]ll the expenses of the proceedings” in 35 U.S.C. § 145 does not invoke expert witness fees with the clarity required to overcome the American Rule’s presumption against fee-shifting.

VALVE CORPORATION v. IRONBURG INVENTIONS LTD.

Before Newman, Lourie, and Dyk. Appeal from the Patent Trial and Appeal Board.

Summary: For purposes of authenticating a prior art reference in IPR proceedings, the Board had an obligation to compare the reference to nearly identical copies in the prosecution histories of the challenged patents.

ELI LILLY AND COMPANY v. TEVA PHARMACEUTICALS

Before Lourie, Bryson and O’Malley. Appeal from the Patent Trial and Appeal Board.

Summary: In claims for methods of using apparatuses or compositions, statements of intended purpose in a preamble tend to be limiting.

TEVA PHARMACEUTICALS v. ELI LILLY AND COMPANY

Before LOURIE, BRYSON, and O’MALLEY. Appeal from the Patent Trial and Appeal Board.

Summary: The presumption of nexus analysis requires the fact finder to consider the unclaimed features of the stated products to determine their level of significance and their impact on the correspondence between the claim and the products.

According to an article published in Nature Biotechnology, Harvard and MIT researchers invented a face mask for detecting SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, via a user’s breath. Instead of relying on a lab, the personal device uses sensors that use wearable freeze-dried cell-free (wFDCF) technology. This technology contains the same molecules that cells use to recognize and manipulate nucleic acids and proteins. According to MedGadget, unlike previous iterations of this technology which store living cells in “tiny aquariums”, wFDCF technology prevents any issues with leakage due to breakage.

In Re PERSONALWEB TECHNOLOGIES LLC

Before Prost, Lourie, and Reyna. Appeal from the District Court for the Northern District of California.

Summary: A patent directed to a medley of mental processes with no inventive concept is patent ineligible under 35 U.S.C. § 101.

SEABED GEOSOLUTIONS (US) INC. v. MAGSEIS FF LLC.

Before Moore, Linn, and Chen. Appeal from the Patent Trial and Appeal Board.

Summary: Where a claim term’s meaning is clear from the intrinsic evidence, no extrinsic evidence of special meaning is considered.

GLAXOSMITHKLINE LLC v. TEVA PHARMACEUTICALS USA, INC. [OPINION] – PRECEDENTIAL

Before Moore, Newman, Prost (dissent). Panel rehearing of an appeal from the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware

Summary: Substantial evidence supported the jury verdict of induced infringement when testimony indicated that a generic failed to carve out a potentially infringing use from a label and the generic’s advertisements provided further evidence of an intent to encourage the patented use.

According to the FDA, the medical device industry experienced significant supply chain disruptions during the COVID-19 pandemic. Such disruptions caused shortages of PPE, ventilators, diagnostic testing, and other medical devices.

The U.S. Supreme Court recently decided a case resolving a patent dispute between two medical device companies, Hologic, Inc. and Minerva Surgical. The opinion was closely watched because it raised the question of whether an inventor who has assigned a patent is legally prevented from later attacking the validity of that same patent — a doctrine historically referred to as “assignor estoppel.”