Patent Law Practice Center

Kyocera Challenge to ADC Personal Communicator Patent Among the Reexamination Requests Filed the Week of May 7, 2012

Here is our latest weekly installment of Reexamination Requests from Scott Daniels, of Reexamination Alert and Practice Center Contributor…

This past Friday, Kyocera requested reexamination of an ADC Technology patent – U.S. Patent No. 6,985,136 – for a “personal communicator,” i.e., a portable computer for wireless data transmission (see inter partes Request No. (4)).  ADC is currently pursuing an infringement action against Kyocera in Illinois.  The ‘136 patent survived an earlier reexamination attempt, with the patentability of all claims confirmed.

NPE Gets Crafty, Sues Etsy For Patent Infringement

For those who haven’t searched for handmade crafts online, Etsy.com is possibly the most popular online marketplace for handmade and vintage goods. Etsy Inc., a Brooklyn-bred start-up, provides users the opportunity to buy and sell crafts online. The Wall Street Journal recently reported that the company raised $40 million from their existing venture capital investors and now has an estimated value of $600 million dollars. It is of no coincidence then that a non-practicing entity waited only a week after the investment news to file a patent infringement claim against Etsy Inc. (more…)

Federal Judge Posner to Use Court Appointed Experts in Apple v. Motorola

The patent litigation between Apple and Motorola has been stand out case among the many involving mobile device technology.  The matter of Apple Inc. and NeXT Software Inc. v. Motorola, Inc., is occurring in varying districts of the United States as well as in several European courtrooms.  The litigation of the case in the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern District, appears to be the most watched within the United States. Federal Judge Richard Posner, who sits on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit in Chicago, Illinois,volunteered to preside over the District Court trial. This move originally drew some attention as Judge Posner is of a quite distinguished status to be overseeing a jury trial.

In his March 10, 2012 Order, Judge Posner noted that his concern, “is that many of the proposed claims constructions are not in language intelligible to jurors…There is no point in giving jurors stuff they won’t understand.”

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Top 5 Patent Law Blog Posts of the Week

Today we continue our weekly installment highlighting the best of the patent blogosphere from the past week. If there are any patent blogs you think should be highlighted by our Top 5, please comment on this post and we’ll check them out.

1) Patently-O: Overlapping Copyright and Patent Rights – This post takes a look at the Oracle v. Google (N.D. Cal. 2012) and how Oracle has argued that Google’s actions constitute both copyright and patent infringement  as the court considers whether Google improperly relied on Java OS code when developing its Android operating system.

2) Patent Docs: Otsuka Pharmaceutical Co. v. Sandoz, Inc. (Fed. Cir. 2012) – Following the Federal Circuit’s decision in Otsuka Pharmaceutical Co. v. Sandoz, Inc., this post provides an explanation of what makes a new chemical compound prima facie obvious, and the differences between obviousness and obviousness-type double patenting for a chemical composition-of-matter invention.

3) IP Watchdog: Patents World-Wide: Deciding Where to Pursue Patent Rights – This post discusses the means through which a company pursue patent protection around the world. The Patent Cooperation Treaty  and popular countries to get patent protection are highlighted, as is the impact of filing international patent applications via these different means. (more…)

Crowd-Sourcing for Prior Art

A recent Wall Street Journal article takes a look at the latest application of crowd-sourcing, this time within the patent industry. As the patent wars rage on, tech companies are soliciting help from the public to crowd-source evidence of prior art. Such evidence is used in patent infringement litigation to invalidate the patents these tech companies are allegedly infringing. The article highlights Article One Partners LLC, a New York-based company hired by major tech-companies to conduct research or prior art in hopes of invalidating the underlying patent.

Here is an excerpt from the Wall Street Journal article entitled, Tech Firms Crowd-Source to Fight Suits, which can be read in full here.

Article One, a New York-based company founded 3½ years ago, opened its Silicon Valley office last August in Palo Alto and has benefited as patent suits have proliferated in the region. With tech companies chasing hot technologies like smartphones and social networking, rivals are increasingly looking to settle their differences in court. Article One says its largest concentration of clients—some 15%—are in Silicon Valley.

Overall, about three-quarters of Article One’s cases are related to high-tech. The site currently features studies seeking prior art on technologies ranging from virtual keyboards to digital payments. Clients pay about $25,000 a study, or they pay varying annual subscription fees. The amount includes the awards for the people who find the best research.