Intellectual Property

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Less than two months after CVC made the surprising move to revoke two of its seminal European CRISPR patents, Sigma-Aldrich has done it too. While the facts that led to Sigma’s “self” revocation may be different than CVC’s, this en vogue trend of avoiding final decisions is troubling because it denies the public of the certainty it deserves. 

There is no shortage of surprises and twists in the decade-long fight over the control of dominant IP in the CRISPR space.  The newest one is the self-revocation of two seminal CRISPR patents in Europe by the team led by two Nobel Laureates Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna (aka “CVC”).  …

On September 10, minutes after the first presidential debate between Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris, an Instagram post set the political world abuzz: Taylor Swift endorsed Harris in the race. The announcement from one of the world’s biggest stars was newsworthy in itself, but IP lawyers likely took note of why she chose to post. Swift explained that she felt compelled to share her views after a photo featuring an AI-generated image of her appearing to endorse Donald Trump was posted online. The image was shared by Trump himself on his social media platform Truth Social, and was circulated widely by his supporters. Swift wrote that the image “really conjured up my fears around AI, and the dangers of spreading misinformation.”

The Federal Circuit’s decision in Edwards Lifesciences Corp. v. Meril Life Sciences Pvt. Ltd., has garnered significant attention, especially concerning the application of the “safe harbor” provision under 35 U.S.C. § 271(e)(1). The Federal Circuit’s ruling, and the subsequent denial of Edwards’s petition for rehearing en banc, underscores the breadth of the safe harbor, putting to bed the question of whether “solely” means “only” in the context of the safe harbor.

An American Arbitration Association arbitrator recently awarded Black Knight, Inc. (BK) $155M stemming from Pennymac Loan Services, LLC’s (Pennymac) alleged use of its mortgage-loan servicing platform to develop its own competing product. Though the arbitrator did not find Pennymac liable for trade secret misappropriation, they found that the use of BK’s product accelerated the development of Pennymac’s product and caused BK to lose licensing profits.

We previously discussed the United States Supreme Court’s June 2023 Jack Daniel’s Properties, Inc. v. VIP Products, LLC decision, which altered the way the “Rogers test,” a doctrine designed to protect First Amendment interests in the trademark context, should be applied. A recent decision out of the Ninth Circuit, Punchbowl, Inc. vs. AJ Press LLC (“Punchbowl II”), applies the Rogers test for the first time following Jack Daniel’s.

Litigators in the life sciences field are no doubt familiar with the so-called “artificial” act of infringement established by 35 U.S.C. § 271(e)(2)(A)-(B): namely, that a party can be sued for patent infringement by merely filing an Abbreviated New Drug Application (“ANDA”) for a generic drug or a Biologics License Application (“BLA”) for a biosimilar drug. The filing of such an action can allow for, among other things, the resolution of patent infringement disputes before the generic (or biosimilar) drug enters the market. 

Recently, in Purdue Pharma L.P. v. Collegium Pharmaceutical, Inc., the Federal Circuit held for the first time that the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (“the Board”) has the authority to issue a Final Written Decision even after the statutory deadline has passed.

Congress introduced post grant review (“PGR”) and inter partes review (“IPR”) in 2011 as part of the America Invents Act (AIA). Parties can use these processes to ask the Board to review the patentability of a patent’s claims. Under the AIA, the Board must provide a Final Written Decision within one year of instituting the PGR or IPR; this can be extended for good cause for an additional six months.