Patent Law Practice Center

On the record with IV co-founder Edward Jung

Edward Jung is one of the co-founders of Intellectual Ventures, one of the largest patent holders in the world. Jung currently serves as chief technology officer at IV, and is responsible for setting strategic technology and new business models for the company.

I recently had the opportunity to interview Jung. The full transcript of our 35-minute conversation appears on IPWatchdog.com. What follows are the highlights of our conversation.

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Intellectual Ventures Goes on the Offensive

Written by Brandon Baum,  of Baum Legal and Practice Center Contributor.

Intellectual Ventures (IV) is what is often referred to derisively as a “patent troll.” It is a non-practicing entity that buys patents in order to monetize them, whether through licensing or litigation. But entities like IV take the view that they are providing a valuable service — they provide inventors with easy access to the economic incentive that fuels invention. In other words, they lubricate the Constitutional mandate “to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts” by creating a ready market for inventions.

IV’s recent patent complaint filed in Delaware makes this point. IV avers as follows:

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Requests for Reexamination of 27 Vesta Medical Patents Among those Filed Week of 8/1/11

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

It was a quiet week on the new reexamination front, except that CareFusion requested reexamination of 27 Vesta Medical patents related to disposal of medical waste.  This does not appear, however, to have been done with hostile intent since Vesta is a subsidiary of CareFusion.

Hostile intent was clearly in evidence, on the other hand, when SAP America requested reexamination of a new Wellogix patent (see inter partes Request No. (1)).  For good measure, on the same day, SAP filed a declaratory judgment action against the same Wellogix patent.

Finally, Reexamination was requested against an Intellectual Ventures patent related to field-programmable gate arrays (see ex parte Request No. (32)).  Last December IV sued Altera and two other companies for infringing on that patent, as well as four other patents.  Since reexamination has now been requested against all five IV patents-in-suit, one or more of the parties might now seek a stay of the litigation pending completion of the reexaminations.  (more…)

USPTO Receives Comments on Patent Reexamination Proposals

Scott McKeown, Partner at Oblon Spivak and Practice Center Contributor, sent in this article discussing the proposals the USPTO is considering in it’s attempt to streamline patent reexamination.

USPTO Posts Public Comments on Patent Reexamination Streamline Proposals

As discussed [on Patents Post Grant] in significant detail over the past few months, the USPTO is considering various proposals in an attempt to streamline patent reexamination. Back in April, the USPTO published a collection of working concepts and initiatives in the Federal Register for the purpose of streamlining patent reexamination. Based upon public commentary, the USPTO will now begin the process of considering to implement/modify the various proposals via a formal rule-making process, or through internal policy changes. (a copy of the Federal Register Notice is found here). (more…)

Reexamination Requests Filed Weeks of 5/16/11 And 5/23/11

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

Apple Attack On MONKEYmedia Audiovisual Patent, Among The Reexamination Requests Filed Week Of May 16, 2011

Last December, Apple defended itself against MONKEYmedia’s patent infringement allegations in the Western District of Texas, by requesting reexamination of two of MM’s streaming media patents-in-suit.  Applehas now sought reexamination of a third MM patent-in-suit (see inter partes Request No. (10)).

Reexamination was also requested by Xilinx for a circuits patent owned by Intellectual Ventures, but it is not clear from the PTO files whether the IV patent is the subject of any infringement litigation (see inter partes Request No. (8)).

And SemiLEDs Corporation has requested reexamination of a Group III nitride LED patent owned by Cree (see inter partes Request No. (7)). The companies are currently in litigation in the Middle District of North Carolina over that patent and four others. (more…)