26 Thursday Feb 2009
Posted in Indiana, Litigation, Patent, Southern District of Indiana
Eli Lilly & Co. v. Teva Pharmaceuticals USA, Inc. (Fed. Cir. 2009)
On Feb. 24, 2009, the Federal Circuit affirmed a decision by the District Court for the Southern District of Indiana to extend the statutory 30-month stay under 21 U.S.C. § 355(j)(5)(B)(iii), thereby preventing the U.S. Food and Drug Administration from approving the Abbreviated New Drug Application (ANDA) filed by Defendant-Appellant Teva Pharmaceuticals USA, Inc.
See Patent Docs for the full case history and analysis.
12 Thursday Feb 2009
Posted in Patent
Happy 200th birthday, Honest Abe! Did you know that President Lincoln, Indiana’s favorite lawyer, was the only president to hold a patent? On May 22, 1849, Lincoln received Patent No. 6469 for a device to lift boats over shoals.
Lincoln was fascinated by maritime technology and frequently visited the Washington Navy Yard to see the latest weapons and engines. Lincoln started work on his invention between sessions of Congress in 1848 when, on his way home to Illinois, his boat became stranded on a sandbar. Click here for the full story.
In 1859, President Lincoln praised the patent laws for having “secured to the inventor, for a limited time, the exclusive use of his invention; and thereby added the fuel of interest to the fire of genius, in the discovery and production of new and useful things.”
Shown below is Lincoln’s scale model which resides at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. Unfortunately, as with many patents, the invention was never manufactured.
11 Wednesday Feb 2009
Posted in Federal Initiatives, Patent
Tags
Yesterday, over 130 US manufacturing companies sent a letter to President Obama detailing their serious concerns about the economic impact that enactment of patent reform legislation would have on the US economy. Recognizing that the 111th Congress may be poised to revisit the patent law reforms that the 110th Congress previously abandoned in 2008, the manufacturers took this opportunity to tell the President their side of the patent reform story. Among the manufacturers were the following four (4) Indiana companies:
Cummins Inc., Columbus, Indiana
DePuy Orthopedics, Warsaw, Indiana
Hill-Rom, Inc., Batesville, Indiana
Zimmer Inc., Warsaw, Indiana
The letter is a quick and interesting read (click image below for full text). The manufacturing companies emphasize that patent damages should not be reduced. Rather, they stress that any legislation should be aimed at improving USPTO operations (currently, the patent application backlog is more than 700,000 and the average pendency is more than 32 months). Taking a pretty obvious jab at the high-tech and financial services industries who aim to benefit from heavy patent reform, the manufacturers argue that “the prosperity of a few companies within two industries should not come at the expense of a larger group of stakeholders.”
I’ve listed below some of the main points that the manufacturing companies include to support their argument that drastic patent reform is unnecessary and perhaps dangerous to our economy:
Click for full text
10 Tuesday Feb 2009
Posted in Patent, Tech Developments
Indianapolis-based start-up medical device maker NICO Corporation announced yesterday that despite declining economic conditions and a sluggish stock market, the company raised $1.73 million in its Series B round of funding. NICO is a privately-held medical device company holding exclusive worldwide patent rights to the newest minimally invasive neuro and spinal tumor removal tool, the Myriad. Click here for full story.
It’s just a press release, but at least it’s some positive news in this rough economy. It’s also a good reminder of the importance of patent acquisition and management for small businesses. Investors often perceive patent portfolios as a demonstration of the high level of expertise, specialization and technological capacity within a business.
10 Tuesday Feb 2009
Posted in Copyright, Dear KLF Legal, Patent
From time to time, people write in with short questions about intellectual property law. We’re always happy to help educate the public about their IP rights, so KLF Legal tries to respond to each inquiry as best we can. The answers tend to be brief since the questions don’t typically include alot of information. However, I thought it might be helpful to share these questions from time to time in a new post category entitled “Dear KLF Legal”…enjoy!
Q: Recently, while visiting family in Hawaii, I was watching TV and stumbled upon an On Demand station entitled PhotoShow TV. Being a photographer, I was intrigued thinking perhaps it was a show covering the latest in photography products and trends. I quickly discovered this was not the case, instead it was a listing of user created photo slideshows that were set to music. These slideshows can be created on the web then published so that anyone can watch them through their Time Warner Oceanic Cable service.
So, my question is two fold, if someone uploads photos and music that they do not have the rights to then who assumes the responsibility for the infringement, Time Warner Oceanic (TWO) or the individual who uploaded the media? I don’t know much about the service but I do know that TWO must approve the content to make sure it is not graphic or offensive. Since they have reviewed and approved all materials, does the infringement responsibility then become theirs?
Here is a link to a bit more information.
A: Thanks for your question. This is very much an issue du jour in copyright/internet law. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), Section 512, is the applicable law, but it’s appropriate application is not particularly clear right now.
Some info about the DMCA:
In the online world, the potentially infringing activities of individuals are stored and transmitted through the networks of third parties. Web site hosting services, Internet service providers, and search engines that link to materials on the Web are just some of the service providers that transmit materials created by others. Section 512 of the DMCA protects online service providers (OSPs) from liability for information posted or transmitted by subscribers if they quickly remove or disable access to material identified in a copyright holder’s complaint (generally referred to as a DMCA takedown notice).
In order to qualify for safe harbor protection, a service provider who hosts content must:
* have no knowledge of, or financial benefit from, infringing activity on its network
* have a copyright policy and provide proper notification of that policy to its subscribers
* list an agent to deal with copyright complaints
Of course, copyright owners want to hold the service providers liable, while the service providers want to claim immunity.
So, to answer your question, arguably TWO has knowledge of the infringing activity if they review each submission as you suggest. This would put them outside the safe harbor and expose them to liability. BUT, I suspect that they’re careful (or should be) about the manner in which they review submissions so that they can still claim the safe harbor protection. The bottom line is it’s a gray area in the law that will probably be sorted out soon at the higher levels by the big players in the industry, Warner Music, YouTube, etc.
Hope this helps.
KLF Legal
Q: I want to produce a game and get a patent to protect it, but it is based off of another license. Do I have to get permission to use the license before I try to get the patent or should I get the patent first?
A: Obtaining a patent can be expensive (think $5,000-$20,000) and the procedure is lengthy (2+ years) so you almost certainly will not want to get a patent first before you are sure that you are cleared to do so. Go back to the license…does it speak to this issue? If you have trouble understanding the language of the license, you may need to have an attorney help you review it. Also, keep in mind that to receive a patent your game must be new, non-obvious and useful. In other words, don’t dump a lot of time and expense into getting a patent before you’ve checked to make sure that a patent could even be received. You can do so by having an patentability search performed on your behalf.
Here’s a helpful article that discusses the benefit of patents in the game industry.
Good luck with your game.
KLF Legal
Indiana Intellectual Property Blog 