Five IP Mistakes To Avoid At All Costs

Does this Lesson really need an introduction?  Here are the five most common mistakes we see in our practice when providing legal counsel for intellectual property protection and enforcement.  The reason usually given for these mistakes (a reason which, although honest, doesn’t help when problems crop up … and in hindsight it can look pretty silly) is that there just isn’t enough time or manpower to work these issues up front.  What often results, unfortunately, is a loss of rights … and money … on the back end.   The Lesson.  Take a look at this short list, and take a few minutes to reflect on the status of your portfolio.  1. Failing to register your trademark. 2....

Dolby Attempts to Enforce Technology Patents Against RIM (Blackberry Storm, Tour, Bold, Pearl, Curve, and other models)

By Steve Thomas 
Here we go again … RIM back in the defendant seat? On June 14, 2011 Dolby International AB filed a patent infringement lawsuit against RIM in the Northern District of California (case no. 3:11-cv-02931) over RIM’s use of advanced audio encoding. At issue are five patents covering audio encoding (US6978236, US7003451, US7382886, US7469206, and US7590543). US6978236, which issued from a national stage filing of a Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) application, claims to cover “… a new method and an apparatus for spectral envelope encoding. The...

Never, Ever, Ever Quit. I4i Sticks to Its Guns against Microsoft… and Wins

It pays to keep fighting. Canadian software developer I4i demonstrated 290 million good reasons to keep fighting last week by sticking to their guns despite Microsoft’s full court press to invalidate the I4i patent. Microsoft was essentially arguing for a change in the standard for invalidating patents by asking the court to use the lower standard of preponderance of the evidence (aka the “51% rule”) from the statutory clear and convincing standard.
The Court didn’t buy Microsoft’s argument, which was supported heavily by briefs from the software industry including such giants as Cisco, Apple, and other amici filers. This case was started in 2007, proceeded through the trial...

Stanford Loses Big To Roche in HIV Patent Dispute

The best way to learn is from other’s mistakes. So, if you are a corporate entity that engages in product development or a university looking to capitalize on your researcher’s ingenuity LISTEN UP. Stanford learned a valuable (and yes, costly) lesson this week at the hands of the Supreme Court. While this wasn’t a real surprise to those of us watching the case there is a good take away here: assignment wording matters. Make sure, make DARN SURE, you get an agreement from every potential inventor in your organization that they actually assign, not just agree to assign, all developed intellectual property to the company (or university). And monitor your inventors to ensure that they do not execute any contradictory...

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