Justia Patents Opinion Summaries

The district court construed the terms "document," "file,"extract," and "template" in patents relating to document processing systems, entered a finding of non-infringement, and awarded $489,150.48 in attorney fees and costs and $141,984.70 in sanctions for violation of Rule 11. The Federal Circuit affirmed.The district court properly made an "exceptional case" finding, based on plaintiff's litigation misconduct and baseless infringement action, and awarded attorney fees and sanctions. View "Eon-Net LP v. Flagstar Bancorp" on Justia Law

Plaintiff claimed that several of defendant's brands of toilet paper infringed on its trademark design. The district court entered summary judgment, holding that toilet paper embossed patterns are functional and cannot be protected as a registered trademark under the Lanham Act, 15 U.S.C. 1115(b)(8). The Seventh Circuit affirmed. Plaintiff patented the design, claiming it to be functional and can only claim the protection of a patent, not that of a trademark. The "central advance" claimed in the utility patents is embossing a quilt-like diamond lattice filled with signature designs that improves perceived softness and bulk, and reduces nesting and ridging. This is the same essential feature claimed in the trademarks. View "Georgia-Pacific Consumer Prods. v. Kimberly-Clark Corp." on Justia Law

The 2004 application was directed to a method and system of friction welding; in friction welding, a first part is rotated rapidly and brought into contact with a second part so that the heat generated between the parts fuses them. This causes material from the parts to be displaced or upset, reducing the combined lengths of the welded parts. The invention of the application is designed to decrease the variation in upset between parts from repeated use of the welding machinery by modulating the torque applied to the rotating first part. The application had 34 claims. The examiner rejected claims 1–24 and 30–34 for obviousness over three prior art references. The Board held that claims 1, 8, 17, and 23 would have been obvious and affirmed rejection of claim 30. The Federal Circuit affirmed. The Board reasonably interpreted Rule 41.37 to require more substantive arguments in an appeal brief than a mere recitation of the claim elements and a naked assertion that the corresponding elements were not found in the prior art. View "In re Lovin" on Justia Law

Plaintiff, a pharmaceutical company, owns a patent that claims conjugated estrogen pharmaceutical compositions for use in hormone replacement therapies. Plaintiff alleged infringement of the patent based on defendant's Abbreviated New Drug Application for a generic version of plaintiff's hormone replacement therapy product, arguing the doctrine of equivalents. The district court entered summary judgment for defendant. The Federal Circuit affirmed. Plaintiff failed to rebut the presumption of prosecution history estoppel based on unforeseeability. The doctrine of prosecution history estoppel prevents a patent owner from recapturing, through the doctrine of equivalents, subject matter surrendered to acquire the patent. Because plaintiff narrowed the scope of the patent's claims in response to a prior art rejection, a presumption of prosecution history estoppel applies. View "Duramed Pharm., Inc. v. Paddock Labs, Inc." on Justia Law

This suit stemmed from the efforts of plaintiff and its owner and founder to obtain a patent for an invention related to personalized postage stamps and the suit involved state law claims of fraud and breach of fiduciary duty in connection with a patent application. Plaintiff appealed the district court's grant of summary judgment in favor of defendants, holding that there was no genuine issue of material fact as to whether plaintiff's claims were time-barred such that defendants were entitled to judgment as a matter of law and that in the alternative, there was no genuine issue of material fact as to the causation elements of plaintiff's claims. The court held that this case raised issues of patent law, and those issues were substantial because of the special federal interest in developing a uniform body of patent law in the Federal Circuit as recognized in Scherbatskoy v. Halliburton Co. and expressed by Congress's grant of exclusive appellate jurisdiction over patent cases to that court. Therefore, the court held that it lacked jurisdiction over the appeal and transferred the suit to the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit pursuant to 28 U.S.C. 1631. View "USPPS, Ltd. v. Avery Dennison Corp., et al." on Justia Law

A jury found infringement of certain claims of plaintiff's patents, relating to retractable syringes, which are medical syringes that feature a needle that retracts into the syringe body after the syringe is used, and found that the asserted patents were not invalid for anticipation or obviousness. The federal circuit affirmed in part and reversed in part.court erred in its construction of the claim term "body;" in light of the specifications, that term refers to a one-piece structure. View "Retractable Techs., Inc. v. Becton Dickinson & Co." on Justia Law

The patents concern vehicle computer systems. The car-mail patents cover systems for notifying owners about the condition of the vehicle; the radio patent relates to the entertainment system. Service provider patents concern maintenance; search patents and status patents allow searches of vehicle systems. A notable-condition patent relates to emergent situations. The district court found the status patent, the car-mail patent, and notable condition patent unenforceable due to inequitable conduct; granted summary judgment of noninfringement of the car-mail patents, service provider patents, and the radio patent; and granted summary judgment of infringement of the notable condition patent. The Federal Circuit affirmed the determinations of noninfringement, reversed with respect to validity of the notable condition patent, and vacated and remanded the decision on inequitable conduct. To prove inequitable conduct, the accused infringer must provide evidence that the applicant misrepresented or omitted material information with specific intent to deceive the patent office. The district court applied the wrong standard in finding intent and failed to make a finding that the withheld information would have blocked issuance of the patents. View "Am. Calcar, Inc. v. Am. Honda Motor Co., Inc." on Justia Law

Plaintiff and defendant had co-pending patents relating to innovations in dietary supplements, particularly formulations that increase the bioavailability of creatine, an amino acid derivative naturally present in muscle tissue. Plaintiff sought a declaratory judgment that the defendant's patent was invalid and not infringed; defendant responded alleging infringement and seeking declaratory judgment that plaintiff's patent was invalid. The district court ruled in favor of defendant. The Federal Circuit affirmed in part and reversed in part. Defendant's patent is not invalid and is infringed, but the court lacked jurisdiction with respect to plaintiff's patent. The court applied the correct standard under 35 U.S.C. 282: each claim of patent is presumed valid, an accused infringer must prove invalidity by clear and convincing evidence. The plaintiff did not establish prior invention or disclosure in prior art. Plaintiff offered no argument as to why or how the process it employed did not infringe defendant's patent. Plaintiff never accused defendant of infringement; defendant has, at most, an economic interest in clarifying its customers' rights under plaintiff's patents. Absent a substantial controversy between the parties, the court lacked declaratory judgment jurisdiction. View "Creative Compunds, LLC . Starmark Labs." on Justia Law

Plaintiff holds a patent on formulations of a hypnotic sleep-inducing drug that is one of a class of compounds known as benzodiazepines. Pharmacological formulations of the drug have been marketed internationally for the treatment of insomnia since the 1970s, and in the United States since 1981. Plaintiff responded to an FDA filing by a competitor by filing an infringement claim. The district court found plaintiff's patents invalid on grounds of obviousness. The Federal Circuit affirmed. The only limitation of the disputed claims that was not fully disclosed by the prior art capsules is the lower dosage; those skilled in the art (physicians) have an undisputed preference for prescribing the lowest effective dose. View "Tyco Healthcare Group LP v. Mutual Pharmaceutical Co., Inc." on Justia Law

The district court entered summary judgment, finding that asserted patents relating to modernizing conventional elevator systems by allowing passenger to input their destinations when calling for an elevator were invalid for failure to meet the definiteness requirement of 35 U.S.C. 112. The Federal Circuit reversed and remanded. The district court erred in holding that the claimed "modernizing device" and "computing unit" limitations were means-plus-function limitations subject to the requirement and that the written descriptions failed to disclose any corresponding structure. The inventor did not draft the claims in "means for" format, and his decision to avoid the term "means" raises a strong presumption that the claimed "computing unit" connotes sufficiently definite structure to those skilled in the art. View "Inventio Ag v. Thyssenkrupp Elevator Ams. Corp." on Justia Law