IP Legal News
Here are several stories that did not warrant a full post, or that were so well done by another blogger that there was no point in recreating the wheel:
- The Federal Circuit upheld Judge Coar's preliminary injunction in Abbott v. Sandoz, No. 05 C 5373 -- click here to read the Federal Circuit's opinion and here to read the Blog's prior posts on the case. Dennis Crouch at Patently-O has a good post explaining the central issue of the case -- a defendant's burden of proof regarding invalidity in the likelihood of success analysis. Judge Newman wrote the majority decision with Judge Gajarsa dissenting. Crouch sees the case as a "good vehicle" for en banc review of the preliminary injunction standard.
- Ocean Tomo is holding its 8th IP auction at home in Chicago this Wednesday and Thursday.
- Michael Sadowitz at the MTTLR Blog has a great post (click here to read it) discussing one of the big post-eBay unknowns, who sets post-verdict damages when a permanent injunction is not issued, judges or juries. Sadowitz looks at a string of Eastern District of Texas cases letting juries set post-verdict damages. Sadowitz also notes that the few courts that have looked at the issue have split as to whether post-verdict damages can be severed from the damages portion of the trial.
- Finally, having mastered all things drug and device related, the Drug & Device Law blog has moved into the patent realm, with some excellent analysis by their colleagues Kevin McDonald and Larry Rosenberg of Jones Day. The post (click here to read it) discusses a recent Federal Circuit decision which held that cash payments made to settle Hatch-Waxman patent litigations do not violate antitrust laws, under certain conditions:
On October 15, 2008, the Federal Circuit joined the growing list of federal courts to hold that the use of cash payments to settle Hatch-Waxman patent litigation does not violate the antitrust laws as long as (1) the settlement excludes no more competition than would the patent itself and (2) the claim for patent infringement and/or validity is not a “sham,” that is, not “objectively baseless.” In In re Ciprofloxacin Hydrochloride Antitrust Litigation, No. 08-1097, 2008 WL 4570669 (Fed. Cir. Oct. 15, 2008), a unanimous panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed the summary judgment granted to Bayer by the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York, holding that Bayer’s settlement of patent litigation with a generic pharmaceutical manufacturer did not violate the antitrust laws.
