Supreme Court Uncertain On Claim Construction Standard

The Supreme Court’s new term got off to a hot start in the patent field with Teva Pharmaceuticals v. Sandoz. At oral argument on October 15, 2014, the justices wrestled with themselves and each other over how to weigh competing interests and rules in a case that could, depending on the outcome, change patent litigation...

Total Eclipse of the Claims

Alice was a busy girl Labor Day week. In the space of two days, the two month–old Supreme Court opinion was applied by district courts in California, Delaware, and Texas to grant dispositive motions finding patent claims patent–ineligible for claiming computer–implemented abstract ideas. Loyalty Conversion: Sitting by designation in the Eastern District of Texas, Judge...

The New Normal? Federal Circuit Affirms Invalidity Under Alice

Yesterday, the Federal Circuit issued an opinion in buySAFE v. Google, its latest opinion on patent eligibility after Alice v. CLS Bank, affirming the judgment of the district court that the asserted claims were invalid because they claimed nothing more than the abstract idea of guaranteeing performance of a transaction implemented on a computer. Perhaps the...

Patent Opinion Day: Supreme Court Twice Reverses Federal Circuit

Two major patent cases were decided today by a unanimous Supreme Court in short, sharp opinions reversing the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals: In the closely–watched Limelight v. Akamai case, dealing with induced infringement of method claims, the high court reversed the Federal Circuit’s holding that a court could find induced infringement without direct infringement performed or...