The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit recently ended much of the controversy surrounding product-by-process claims in Abbott Laboratories v. Sandoz, Inc., but arguably created a new debate in the intellectual property world.  The court overruled an earlier panel decision from Scripps Clinic & Research Foundation v. Genetech, Inc., instead following the precedent set by Atlantic Thermoplastics Co. v. Faytex Corp. Atlantic Thermoplastics states that product-by-process claims are only infringed if the specific process steps that are in the original patent are used by the accused patent infringer. It is not infringement to produce the final product by any method that does not include the process steps outlined in the patent.

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Posted in Infringement, Patentability, Patents, Pharmaceutical Drugs
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On Friday, July 31^st, the United States House Committee on Energy and Commerce approved “America’s Affordable Health Choices Act” by a narrow three-vote margin. The bill was introduced in the House by Wisconsin Democrat Representative John Dingell. Representatives from around the country stated that the bill “will deliver the results the nation’s health care system so desperately needs: lower costs, better quality, and broader coverage.”

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Posted in Commercialization, Patentability, Pharmaceutical Drugs
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Australia is now at the centre of the global gene patent debate with a Senate inquiry that began last week in Melbourne. Senators in Australia began hearing public submissions on August 4th about the topic of gene patents in relation to the impact they have on health care costs. The inquiry centres around a bid to stop gene patenting in Australia because of claims that the patents are stifling research efforts.

Professor Ian Olver, representing the Cancer Council of Australia, stated, “We don’t think people should have a monopoly just because they have discovered a gene.” However, Olver does agree that treatments should be patentable:

“If they invent a treatment as a result, by all means.”

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Posted in Infringement, Patentability, Uncategorized
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On Monday, July 13^th, Mosaid Technologies Inc. filed a suit against IBM Corporation for patent infringement concerning six of Mosaid’s United States patents. The suit was filed in the United States District Court in the District of Delaware. Mosaid, an Ottawa-based company, is well known for developing semiconductor technology. The patents involved in the suit concern Mosaid’s fundamental dynamic random access memory (DRAM) circuit inventions that are used in IBM’s microprocessors and Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs). Specifically, Mosaid argues that IBM has, and is still, infringing on U.S. Patent Nos. 6,603,703; 6,580,654; 6,980,448; 7,038,937; 7,486,580; and 7,535,749.

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Posted in Infringement, Patent Trolls, Patents
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