Federal Case Summaries
Show: 1 day 1 week 1 month All
Custom (decided): –
Clear all
Coverage since November 3, 1994
✉️ New decisions, briefed in your inbox every morning — subscribe to Daily Case Law, free →

Federal

Federal Circuit
Uncategorized

VirnetX v. Cisco Systems — Federal Circuit Vacates $368M Patent Damages for Failure to Apportion and Improper Royalty Methodology

The Federal Circuit vacated a $368 million patent verdict against Cisco and Apple in VirnetX’s network security patent case, rejecting the Nash Bargaining Solution as a royalty methodology and requiring strict apportionment to the patented features even when the smallest salable unit is the ac

Federal Circuit
Uncategorized

Carnegie Mellon University v. Marvell Technology — Federal Circuit Awards $1.5B for Willful Infringement of Hard Drive Signal Processing Patents

The Federal Circuit affirmed a landmark $1.5 billion damages award against Marvell Technology for willful infringement of Carnegie Mellon University’s hard drive signal processing patents — one of the largest patent verdicts in history — while vacating parts of the damages calculation and rema

Federal Circuit
Uncategorized

Digitech Image Technologies v. Electronics for Imaging — Federal Circuit Holds Data Structures and Mathematical Relationships Are Not Patentable

The Federal Circuit held that a patent claiming an image device profile — a collection of color and spatial data — was patent-ineligible, finding that a data structure without physical embodiment is not patentable, and that methods consisting only of mathematical correlations are abstract ideas.

Federal Circuit
Uncategorized

Apple v. Motorola (2014) — Federal Circuit Rejects Per Se Rule Against Injunctions for FRAND-Encumbered Standard-Essential Patents

The Federal Circuit reversed Judge Posner’s dismissal of patent damages claims and held there is no categorical rule barring injunctions for standard-essential patents — but affirmed that Motorola could not obtain an injunction on its FRAND-committed SEP because it had already committed to lic

Federal Circuit
Uncategorized

Teva Pharmaceuticals v. Sandoz (Federal Circuit 2013) — Court Applies De Novo Review to All Claim Construction, Drawing Supreme Court Reversal

The Federal Circuit applied de novo review to all aspects of claim construction and affirmed the invalidity of Teva’s multiple sclerosis drug patents — a ruling the Supreme Court partially reversed in 2015, holding that underlying factual findings in claim construction must be reviewed for cle

Federal Circuit
Uncategorized

InterDigital Communications v. ITC — Federal Circuit Addresses Standard-Essential Patents and FRAND Licensing at the ITC

The Federal Circuit affirmed the ITC’s exclusion order against Huawei and ZTE for infringing InterDigital’s standard-essential wireless patents, while clarifying important questions about the ITC’s authority to issue exclusion orders involving FRAND-committed patents — decisions th

Federal Circuit
Uncategorized

Fresenius USA v. Baxter International — Federal Circuit on Collateral Estoppel Between Parallel IPR and District Court Proceedings

The Federal Circuit held that when the PTO cancels a patent’s claims during reexamination proceedings that conclude while district court litigation is still pending on appeal, the cancellation moot the district court judgment of infringement — there is no longer a valid patent to infringe — ev

Federal Circuit
Uncategorized

Commil USA v. Cisco Systems (2013) — Federal Circuit Holds Good-Faith Invalidity Belief Can Negate Induced Infringement Intent

The Federal Circuit held that a defendant’s good-faith belief that the asserted patent is invalid can negate the specific intent required for induced infringement — a ruling the Supreme Court reversed in 2015, clarifying that validity and infringement are separate inquiries and invalidity is n

Federal Circuit
Uncategorized

Ultramercial v. Hulu — Federal Circuit’s Evolving § 101 Analysis for Internet Advertising Patents

The Federal Circuit initially held Ultramercial’s patent on a method of distributing copyrighted media over the internet by requiring viewers to watch an advertisement to be patent-eligible — but after Supreme Court remand in light of Alice v. CLS Bank, reversed and found the claims directed t

Federal Circuit
Uncategorized

CLS Bank International v. Alice Corp. — Federal Circuit En Banc Produces Fractured § 101 Ruling on Software Patents

Ten Federal Circuit judges issued seven different opinions and could not agree on a single legal standard for software patent eligibility under § 101, affirming by an evenly divided court that Alice’s financial settlement patents were invalid — a fractured ruling that led directly to the Supre

Federal Circuit
Uncategorized

Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank (Federal Circuit En Banc 2013) — Court Fragments Over § 101 Framework for Software Patents

The Federal Circuit, sitting en banc, affirmed invalidity of Alice’s financial settlement software patent claims — but produced seven separate opinions with no majority rationale, reflecting deep disagreement on how to apply § 101 to software and setting the stage for the Supreme Court’s

Federal Circuit
Uncategorized

Biosig Instruments v. Nautilus (Federal Circuit 2013) — Court Upholds ‘Spaced Relationship’ Claim Under Lenient Indefiniteness Standard, Drawing Supreme Court Correction

The Federal Circuit held that the term ‘spaced relationship’ in a heart rate monitor patent was not indefinite because it was ‘amenable to construction’ and not ‘insolubly ambiguous’ — applying its then-prevailing indefiniteness test that the Supreme Court unanimo

Federal Circuit
Uncategorized

Lighting Ballast Control v. Philips Electronics — Federal Circuit Reconsiders Claim Construction Standard (Cybor Retained)

The Federal Circuit, sitting en banc, affirmed the Cybor de novo standard of review for claim construction — declining to overturn its 1998 precedent requiring appellate courts to review district court claim construction rulings without deference, in a decision that set the stage for the Supreme Cou

Federal Circuit
Uncategorized

InterDigital Communications v. ITC — Federal Circuit Holds Patent Licensing Alone Satisfies ITC Domestic Industry Requirement

The Federal Circuit affirmed that a patent holder whose domestic industry consists solely of licensing activities — with no domestic manufacturing — can satisfy Section 337’s domestic industry requirement at the ITC, opening the door wider for non-practicing entities to use exclusion orders as

Federal Circuit
Uncategorized

Akamai Technologies v. Limelight Networks — Federal Circuit En Banc Expands Inducement to Cover Divided Method Infringement

The Federal Circuit sitting en banc held that a party who induces multiple actors to collectively perform all steps of a method patent claim can be liable for induced infringement even if no single party directly infringes all steps — significantly expanding liability for divided infringement of int

Federal Circuit
Uncategorized

Bancorp Services v. Sun Life Assurance — Federal Circuit Holds Life Insurance Valuation Patents Invalid as Abstract Ideas

The Federal Circuit held that patents on computer-implemented methods for managing stable-value life insurance policies are directed to an abstract idea and therefore invalid under § 101, ruling that adding generic computer implementation to an abstract mathematical algorithm does not create patent-

Scroll to Top