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What if the patents are invalid? | 337 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
What if the patents are invalid?
Authored by: red floyd on Thursday, December 27 2012 @ 03:47 PM EST
I believe the judge in the RIM case forced RIM to settle, and a settlement
stands regardless of the merits of the patent.

Take with a large crystal of NaCl... IANAL, and am working from memory.

---
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a *CITIZEN* of the United
States of America.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

What if the patents are invalid?
Authored by: tknarr on Thursday, December 27 2012 @ 04:06 PM EST

I think it'd depend on whether it was a jury verdict or a settlement, the terms of any settlement and whether the patent was overturned within the time allowed to file an appeal.

If it was a settlement, if the terms were such that the settlement was final the patent being overturned wouldn't affect the settlement unless the infringer could show that the patent holder misrepresented the situation to get the settlement. OTOH if it were me I'd insist on a term in the settlement allowing for it to be voided and any payments made returned if the patent was overturned within a certain time.

If it was a jury verdict, I'd think that it'd be grounds for appeal for the patent to be overturned. If the time limit for an appeal's passed, you'd be out of luck. But if you still have time to file an appeal when the PTO's ruling is made final, I'd think you could include that on appeal as a statement by the PTO that at the time the jury rendered it's verdict the patent was not valid and thus could not be infringed. The presumption of patent validity I would think can't trump a direct statement by the PTO to the contrary.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

What if the patents are invalid?
Authored by: PJ on Thursday, December 27 2012 @ 06:19 PM EST
Here's what happened to RIM.

The difference is the Apple v. Samsung litigation is not yet final. The parties argued certain issues to the jury and reserved others for the judge, and that last part isn't done yet.

One of the things in front of the judge is a JMOL motion by Samsung, in which it argued that no reasonable jury could find Apple's patents infringed. The judge is still free to agree.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Read up on the RIM case
Authored by: Wol on Thursday, December 27 2012 @ 07:29 PM EST
The judge refused to delay judgement (in particular an injunction) until after
the USPTO reconsidered the patents.

BOTH sides in that case engaged in judicial misbehaviour. If RIM hadn't royally
upset the judge he would probably have waited.

Cheers,
Wol

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Are bad patents premeditated theft, if not economic terrorism?
Authored by: kg on Saturday, December 29 2012 @ 09:41 PM EST

I would think that in the greater scheme of things, fraudulently filed patents (such as the Apple patent that they decided wasn't actually a separate patent after all) and patents that are not granted or due to prior art, etc., could be seen as an attempt to defraud both the public and other companies. Perhaps it's time for the DOJ should investigate and file charges.

IP law originally came from the perspective that patents and copyright are time-limited exceptions to public ownership, and as far as I know that is still the constitutional view of it. Of course, if several patents are filed for the same or a very similar thing prior to the patent being granted, it wouldn't be a problem.

The onus to exhaustively prove that this is a new invention and that prior art does not exist should be on the filer. Successfully challenged patents could be viewed under the most common circumstances (e.g., filing without an extensive search for prior art) to have been gross negligence and an attempt to defraud the public.

In short, filing bad patents could be called economic terrorism.

---
IANAL
Linguist and Open Source Developer

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

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