What’s In A Name? Theresa Earnhardt, widow to professional race car driver Dale Earnhardt and step-mother to Kerry Earnhardt, appealed the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board’s decision that her stepson’s mark, EARNHARDT COLLECTION, was notas a whole primarily a surname. Theresa Earnhardt is the owner of trademark registrations and common law rights in the use of the mark DALE […] Continue Reading →
When Life Hands you Lemons, Make CoQ10 In the Federal Circuit Decision of Soft Gel Technologies, Inc. v. Jarrow Formulas, Inc., the Court found three related Soft-Gel patents invalid for obviousness. The three patents describe a way to dissolve CoQ10 in monoterpenes for enhanced delivery to the body. The patents disclosed two suitable examples, limonene and carvone and derivatives thereof. However, prior […] Continue Reading →
Netlist v. Diablo Continues On July 25, 2017, the Federal Circuit released a nonprecedential opinion vacating the Board’s decisions and remanding for further proceedings because of erroneous construction of certain language. The Board had previously deemed claims 15-17, 22, 24, 26 and 31-33 of U.S. Patent No. 7,881,150 and claims 1, 16, 17, 24 and 30-31 of U.S. […] Continue Reading →
Inevitable Does Not Equal Obvious Earlier this week, the Unites States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (“CAFC”) held that the United States District Court for the District of Delaware clearly erred in its obviousness analysis in Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Inc. v. Sandoz, Inc, reversing the lower court’s decision and entering judgment in favor of Millennium. Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (“Millennium”) […] Continue Reading →
Court of Appeals Gets Specific with Enablement In Storer v. Clark, the Court of Appeals explored whether a provisional application had sufficiently enabled interference subject matter. In order to prove enablement it must be shown that “one skilled in the art, having read the specification, could practice the invention without ‘undue experimentation.’” ALZA Corp. v. Andrx Pharm., LLC, 603 F.3d 935, 940 […] Continue Reading →
Trademark Description: Does job placement software render the service of professional placement and recruitment? In 2004 JobDiva registered the service mark JOBDIVA (U.S. Registration 2,851,917, hereinafter ‚¬Ëœ917) for “personnel placement and recruitment”services. In 2005, JobDiva registered the service mark JOBDIVA (plus design) (U.S. Registration 3,013,235, hereinafter ‚¬Ëœ235) for “personnel placement and recruitment services; computer services, namely, providing databases featuring recruitment and employment, employment advertising, career information and resources, resume […] Continue Reading →
Software patents in the Federal Circuit‚¬¦ One step forward, two steps back. Following the United States Supreme Court’s ruling in the Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank Int’l, (S. Ct. 2014) case (which held that abstract ideas are not patentable), the software and computer industry has been fighting and clawing to peel back the layers of the decision in hopes of finding some clarity as to what is […] Continue Reading →
Federal Circuit Revives Life-Sciences Patent Directed to Law of Nature On Tuesday, the Federal Circuit revived a life-sciences patent that was invalidated as being directed to a law of nature. The patent involved a method for multiple freeze-thaw cycles in liver cells. In Vitro Technologies designed the method by using previously frozen cells and then pooling the cells that remained viable for re-freezing and thawing […] Continue Reading →
Federal Circuit Upholds 180-Day Notice Period for Biosimilars On Tuesday, the Federal Circuit sustained an injunction preventing generic drug maker Apotex, Inc. from selling a similar version of Amgen Inc’s Neulasta drug without a 180 day notice period after being approved by the FDA. The drug is used to boost white blood cell counts in cancer patients and is made using living cells. […] Continue Reading →
Federal Circuit Finds Patent Eligibility for Application of Natural Law The Federal Circuit has handed down its decision in Rapid Litigation Management v. CellzDirect. The technology at issue in the case is a method of freezing-and-thawing a group of hepatocytes and then selecting those that are still viable. The patent-owner sued the defendant for infringement of the patent, and the defendant in turn filed a […] Continue Reading →