Regardless of the June 23, 2016 vote on Brexit, all owners of European patents, and all applicants seeking patents in Europe, will have both new options, and a new set of important decisions to make. Most commentators anticipate that the Unitary Patents (UPs) and the Unified Patent Court (UPC) will come into effect and patentees… Continue Reading
Category Archives: Nanotechnology
Subscribe to Nanotechnology RSS FeedVirtual Patent Marking
Posted in Biotechnology, Development & Commercialization of Technology, Intellectual Property Litigation, Nanotechnology, Patent Counseling & StrategiesPatent Marking Under the patent marking statute, 35 U.S.C. § 287(a), notice can be actual, or constructive notice. Actual notice occurs when the alleged infringer is directly informed that its product infringes the patent. Constructive notice can be achieved by affixing a product with the word “patent” or abbreviation “pat.” along with the patent number…. Continue Reading
Still Alice: Not all software patents are being invalidated under Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank Int’l
Posted in Biotechnology, Development & Commercialization of Technology, Nanotechnology, Patent Counseling & Strategies, UncategorizedOn June 19, 2014, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision in Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank Int’l (Alice)[1]. In Alice, the Court held that several patents that pertained to a computerized platform for eliminating risk in conducting financial transactions between two parties were ineligible for patenting under 35 U.S.C. §101[2]. The Court reasoned… Continue Reading
Alice in Wonderland: The Ongoing Impact of Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank Int’l on Computer-Implemented Inventions
Posted in Biotechnology, Development & Commercialization of Technology, Nanotechnology, Patent Counseling & StrategiesOn June 19, 2014, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision in Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank Int’l (Alice)[i]. In Alice, the Court held that several patents that pertained to a computerized platform for eliminating risk in conducting financial transactions between two parties were ineligible for patenting under 35 U.S.C. §101[ii]. The Court reasoned… Continue Reading
Board Oversight of Cybersecurity
Posted in Biotechnology, Nanotechnology, Technology News & EventsCyber-attacks on U.S. companies have increased over recent years resulting in significant costs to companies. According to surveys, U.S. companies have experienced a 42% increase between 2011 and 2012 in the number of cyber-attacks they experienced per week[1] and the average annualized cost of cyber-attacks for various U.S. companies surveyed in 2013 was $11.56 million,… Continue Reading
Are Computer-implemented Inventions Patent Eligible? Go ask Alice
Posted in Biotechnology, Development & Commercialization of Technology, Nanotechnology, Patent Counseling & StrategiesOn June 19, 2014, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision in Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank Int’l (Alice)[i]. In Alice, the Court held that several computer-implemented patents were not eligible for patenting under 35 U.S.C. §101 because they were drawn to nothing more than an abstract idea[ii]. In response to the decision, the… Continue Reading
Financing with IP Collateral
Posted in Biotechnology, Development & Commercialization of Technology, Nanotechnology, Patent Counseling & Strategies, Technology News & Events, Technology Transactions, Venture Capital, Private Equity and Other FinancingsIn a recent guest post on the Patently-O blog by Dennis Crouch, http://patentlyo.com/, William Mann, an assistant professor of finance at the Anderson School of Management, UCLA, notes the explosion in USPTO filings that record a creditor’s security interest in a patent. Secured debt can be a significant source of financing for many technology companies,… Continue Reading
Early Assignment of your Invention as a Method to Maintain Priority Rights in a European Patent Application
Posted in Biotechnology, Development & Commercialization of Technology, Nanotechnology, Patent Counseling & StrategiesThe European Patent Office (EPO) has been a desirable venue for seeking patent protection in Europe. For instance, a patent application granted by the EPO can provide patent protection in many European countries, such as the United Kingdom, France, and Germany[1]. Many of the patent applications that are filed in the EPO seek the priority… Continue Reading
Intellectual Capital Development for Technology Companies, Cost Effective Adjunct to IP
Posted in Biotechnology, Development & Commercialization of Technology, Employment & Personnel Issues, Intellectual Property Litigation, Nanotechnology, Patent Counseling & Strategies, Technology News & Events, Technology Transactions, Venture Capital, Private Equity and Other FinancingsThe term Intellectual Capital means different things to different people even in the technology space. For business planning purposes, intellectual capital should be recognized as more than patents, copyrights, and other forms of intellectual property, extending broadly to employee skills, knowledge, and problem solving abilities. This is sometimes referred to as a company’s or its… Continue Reading
Rebutting a Prima Facie Case of Obviousness
Posted in Biotechnology, Nanotechnology, Patent Counseling & Strategies, UncategorizedObtaining a patent for an invention requires the crossing of many statutory hurdles. One of the main statutory hurdles is to rebut any contentions by a patent examiner that an invention may be obvious (i.e., rebutting a prima facie case obviousness). Many strategies may be utilized to rebut a prima facie case of obviousness…. Continue Reading
Are Human Genes Patentable? It depends,
Posted in Biotechnology, Development & Commercialization of Technology, Intellectual Property Litigation, Nanotechnology, Patent Counseling & Strategies, Technology News & Events, Technology TransactionsOn June 13, 2013, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision on the issue of whether or not human genes are patentable. In Association for Molecular Pathology v. Myriad Genetics, Inc. (the Myriad decision), the Court unanimously held that naturally occurring deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) segments are products of nature and not patent eligible, even… Continue Reading