How many of the lawyers out there liked hypotheticals in law school? I did not, but this case prompted me to write one!  So, for those of you who enjoy hypotheticals, here it is:

Company A, a North Carolina LLC, owns four patents.  A new company is formed, Company B, a Texas LLC.  Company B has the same corporate address in North Carolina and the same five shareholders as Company A.  Company B conducts no business activities.  About 20 days after Company B is formed, Company A assigns its four patents to Company B, with an agreement that gives Company B the rights to sue for patent infringement only in the district court for the Western District of Texas.  (And assume that the Western District of Texas is a very fast and favorable court for plaintiffs in patent infringement cases.)  About ten days after the assignment, Company B files two lawsuits for patent infringement in the Western District of Texas, alleging that the defendants sell mobile devices that use third party applications that infringe the patents.  The defendants move to transfer the cases to the district court in the Northern District of California on grounds of convenience.  They allege that the Western District of Texas is not the proper venue because most of the third-party applications were researched and developed in the Northern District of California, while none were developed in the Western District of Texas, and several witnesses and inventors were located in the Northern District of California, while none were in the Western District of Texas.  Here’s the question: Should the district court for the Western District of Texas grant the motions to transfer?
Continue Reading You Can’t Manipulate Venue!

Pfizer and BioNTech recently asked the Southern District of California to dismiss a patent infringement claim from Allele Biotechnology related to Pfizer and BioNTech’s Covid-19 vaccine.

Allele holds a patent for a fluorescent protein called mNeonGreen, which causes some cells to glow when exposed to certain kinds of light.  Allele does not claim that mNeonGreen

The answer is “Yes” because the U.S. government has waived sovereign immunity for claims of patent infringement.  This means the U.S. government can be sued for patent infringement in at least some instances.  However, special rules and certain limitations apply as explained in 28 U.S.C. § 1498, which states, in part:

(a) Whenever an invention described in and covered by a patent of the United States is used or manufactured by or for the United States without license of the owner thereof or lawful right to use or manufacture the same, the owner’s remedy shall be by action against the United States in the United States Court of Federal Claims for the recovery of his reasonable and entire compensation for such use and manufacture.

As a result, patent infringement lawsuits against the United States government, are not brought in Federal district courts but rather in the Court of Federal Claims, which is a special court “authorized to hear primarily money claims founded upon the Constitution, federal statutes, executive regulations, or contracts, express or implied in fact, with the United States.”  See https://www.uscfc.uscourts.gov/.  Further, a patent owner cannot sue a federal contractor who made the allegedly infringing product or performed the allegedly infringing method, but instead, must sue the U.S. government.  Note, however, the U.S. government’s contract with the federal contractor may require the contractor to indemnify the government for liability and costs.
Continue Reading Can the U.S. Government Be Liable for Patent Infringement?

The case of Egenera, Inc. v. Cisco Systems, Inc. raised the question of whether inventors named on a patent can be repeatedly changed as litigation strategy changes. Because of judicial estoppel, the district court said no way.  But, on appeal, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit said no problem—at least no problem in this case.

Mr. Shulter was listed as an inventor on Egenera, Inc.’s (“Egenera”) patent application and the resulting patent, U.S. Patent No. 7,231,430 (the “’430 Patent”).  The ‘430 patent relates to “a platform for automatically deploying a scalable and reconfigurable virtual network” of processors.  The claimed approach alleviates the need for physical reconfiguration of processors by allowing “processing resources [to] be deployed rapidly and easily through software.”
Continue Reading No Judicial Estoppel in the Case of the On-Again, Off-Again Patent Inventor

An unpublished decision from the Northern District of California emphasizes how important it is for attorneys to follow patent local rules.

Patent local rules are rules that many federal district courts have for patent infringement cases. These rules supplement the regular local rules for that court and the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, and allow the courts that have a lot of patent infringement cases to more efficiently manage those cases. Patent local rules are also helpful to the parties and their counsel, as they provide a standard structure and some certainty to the litigation process.
Continue Reading Make Sure You Follow the Patent Local Rules!