Personalized Media Communications, LLC v. Apple, Inc., Appeal No. 2021-2275 (Fed. Cir. Jan. 20, 2023) Our Case of the Week focuses on the doctrine of prosecution laches. Following a bench trial on the issue held shortly after the Federal Circuit’s decision in Hyatt v. Hirshfeld, 998 F.3d 1347 (Fed. Cir. 2021), the district court found Personalized Media Communications’ patent unenforceable under the doctrine ...
Dionex Softron GmbH v. Agilent Techs., Inc., Appeal No. 21-2372 (Fed. Cir. Jan. 6, 2023) This week’s Case of the Week, the only precedential patent opinion issued by the Federal Circuit this week, focused primarily on the corroboration requirement for relevant dates of invention. The Court held there was sufficient evidence of a reduction to practice as of a given date, based primarily on corroboration of multiple witnesses, notwithstanding limited documentary evidence ...
International Business Machines Corp. v. Zillow Group, Inc. et al., Appeal No. 2021-2350 (Fed. Cir. 2022) In this week’s Case of the Week, the Federal Circuit affirmed a Rule 12(c) judgment on the pleadings that IBM’s U.S. Patent Nos. 9,158,789 (the ’789 patent) and 7,187,389 (the ’389 patent) are drawn to patent-ineligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101 ...
Nature Simulation Systems Inc. v. Autodesk, Inc., Appeal No. 2020-2257 (Fed. Cir. Jan. 27, 2022) In its only precedential patent decision this week, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit corrected what it considered to be an incorrect standard for claim indefiniteness applied by the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. In doing so, the Federal Circuit reversed the lower court’s holding that claims of Nature Simulation Systems, Inc ...
Kyocera Senco Industrial Tools Inc. v. International Trade Commission, Appeal No. 2020-1046, -2050 (Fed. Cir. Jan. 21, 2022) The Federal Circuit’s only precedential patent decision this week comes on appeal from the International Trade Commission, where an Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) found noninfringement and the Commission reversed. The Federal Circuit addressed the issues of qualifications to provide technical expert testimony, claim construction, and references ...
Realtime Adaptive Streaming LLC v. Netflix, Inc., Appeal Nos. 2021-1484, -1485, -1518, -1519 (Fed. Cir. July 27, 2022) In our Case of the Week, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit concisely affirmed an award of attorneys’ fees for gamesmanship that can be politely characterized as “impermissible forum shopping.” Judge Reyna dissented because he did not think the sanctions went far enough ...
CareDx, Inc. v. Natera, Inc., Appeal Nos. 2022-1027, -1028 (Fed. Cir. July 18, 2022) In its only precedential patent opinion this week, the Federal Circuit held patents directed to the detection of organ transplant failure to be ineligible under Section 101. The patents at issue were all owned by Stanford University and licensed to CareDx. The patents concern the detection of organ transplant failure. When a transplanted organ is rejected, the body releases cfDNA ...
LG Electronics Inc. v. Immervision, Inc., Appeal Nos. 2021-2037, -2038 (Fed. Cir. 2022) In this week’s Case of the Week, the Federal Circuit considered how to treat a prior art reference in which the alleged teaching of a claim element would be understood by a skilled artisan not to be an actual teaching, but rather an error of a typographical or similar nature ...
In last week’s only precedential opinion issued in a patent case, the Federal Circuit reversed contempt and sanctions orders entered by the District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin following defendant’s alleged violations of a stipulated protective order governing discovery. This case offers useful guidance for patent litigants contemplating a coordinated defense with similarly-situated parties in other litigation ...
On June 22, 2017, BOEM announced that, in light of the recent order of the Secretary of the Interior concerning its recent NTL 2016-N01 establishing a new program for financial assurance for decommissioning liabilities on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS), it will extend the NTL implementation timeline beyond June 30, except in circumstances where there is a substantial risk of nonperformance of the interest holder’s decommissioning liabilities ...
Boomer’s accommodation is booming. Investors are keen on Later Living as an area with incredible demand and limited supply. So, to ensure you are talking the right lingo, we thought we could help out with an alphabetical glossary of key terms. Later Living, as a phrase and a distinct subsector of the residential property market, is the “catch all” term used for the assorted types of accommodation available to people in later life ...
Provisur Technologies, Inc. v. Weber, Inc., Appeal Nos. 2021-1942, -1975 (Fed. Cir. Sept. 27, 2022) In this week’s Case of the Week, the Federal Circuit reviewed an IPR decision and addressed the Patent Trial and Appeal Board’s consideration of certain evidence submitted to supplement a prior art disclosure. The Court also found that the Board violated the Administrative Procedures Act (APA) by failing to sufficiently explain its rationale concerning its obviousness determinations ...
The Ecuadorian Civil Code is based in the code that made the great Chilean jurist Andrés Bello. The majority Civil Codes in Latin America are based in the Andres Bello Civil Code´s, which is based on the Civil Code of Napoleon Bonaparte. It has had several reforms over the time, on which attempt has been made to update to the reality and circumstances of each time. The Ecuadorian Civil Code is divided in four books: i) Persons; ii) Goods; iii) Succession upon death; and, iv) Obligations ...
In July 2022, the European Commission launched a public consultation on its draft proposals for the future of the Motor Vehicle Block Exemption Regulation (‘MVBER’) regime. The proposals include (i) a draft Regulation prolonging the validity of the existing MVBER for five years and (ii) a draft Communication introducing targeted updates to the Supplementary Guidelines. Comments may be submitted by the 30 September 2022 ...
Commercial landlords and tenants have less than five months to go until the first major change comes into force following the government implementing the Minimum Energy Efficiency Standards (MEES) in 2018. Currently, a commercial landlord cannot grant a new lease of a property that has an energy performance rating of less than E - unless an exemption applies ...
Key Points The Supreme Court's upcoming decision regarding the Affordable Care Act could render its tax provisions retroactively unconstitutional. Depending on the outcome, there is a potential opportunity for refunds on open tax years for taxpayers who paid the net investment income tax and additional Medicare tax. For most taxpayers, the deadline for a protective claim of refund on a 2016 tax return, filed without extensions, is July 15, 2020 ...
In principle, the decision to vote electronically should have been taken as early as February 2020, at a time when few had ever heard of Covid-19. Companies that did not do so at that time but, as a result of Covid-19, would like to do so now for security reasons or because their staff still (mostly) work from home, have been given the opportunity to still introduce electronic voting. However, they have to reach an agreement on this issue at the latest on day X + 56 (i.e ...
Lao PDR is following the regional trend of taxing the activities of non-resident E-Commerce and digital platform service providers. In this client update, we provide the key features and our commentary on the Ministry of Finance’s Notification on the Implementation of the Tax Obligations of the E-Commerce and Digital Platform No. 0541/MOF, dated 24 February 2022 (“the Notification”) ...
The unconstitutional nature of property devolving on the Government of Malta following the procedure to render a company defunct Introduction On 12 October 2023, the First Hall of the Civil Court in its Constitutional Jurisdiction delivered a landmark ruling in the case Carmel Cortis et vs. Office of the Prime Minister et ...
On Oct. 19, 2021, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a proposed rule that would establish a new category of over-the-counter (OTC) hearing aids. The rule came in response to President Joe Biden’s July 9 executive order, which among other things, calls for wide availability of low-cost hearing aids in order to promote economic competition ...
The liability of online platforms for the activities of third-party vendors has always been a controversial area. With the explosion of online shopping as a result of the pandemic, the issue has come under increased scrutiny. Although cases in the UK and EU have discussed the factors that the Court will consider in deciding whether the operator of an online platform is jointly liable, the position in Hong Kong remained uncertain, until now ...
Last month the Scottish Government published “Land Reform in a Net Zero Nation”, a consultation paper on a new Land Reform Bill. The paper sets out the proposals for the bill and seeks views on various related issues, including measures aimed at “large-scale holdings”, changes to subsidies, the introduction of a new type of agricultural tenancy, and transparency of land ownership ...
A gym franchisor recently secured a preliminary injunction against its former franchisee prohibiting the franchisee from operating an independent gym on the same location and using the franchisor’s trade secrets. Chris O’Hare, along with his company, (O’Hare), was a former Core Progression gym franchisee ...
