The Supreme People’s Court of China recently issued a new judicial interpretation regarding preliminary injunctions (PI) for intellectual property (IP) disputes that took effect on January 1, 2019, officially titled “Provisions of The Supreme People’s Court on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Laws in Adjudication of Action Preservation Cases Involving IP Disputes” (Provisions). The…

The same claims a jury found mobile carrier Sprint liable of infringing were later held invalid under Section 101 by the Federal Circuit in an appeal brought by cell provider T-Mobile. The judgment against Sprint had not been made final. Case date: 01 February 2019 Case number: No. 2018-1108 Court: United States Court of Appeals, Federal Circuit…

AstraZeneca tried to enjoin Hexal from marketing its Fulvestrant-medicament in main proceedings (after already having failed in PI-proceedings) due to alleged patent infringement of AstraZeneca’s Swiss-type claim patent. The Dusseldorf Court of Appeal, however, dismissed the appeal (docket-no I-2 U 29/18). To understand the implications of this case, one has to first step back and…

For manufacturers of biologics and biosimilars facing potential patent litigation in the U.S., the Biologics Price Competition and Innovation Act (BPCIA) imposes a complex statutory scheme that restricts the timing and control of disputes in federal district court. Biosimilar applicants who find themselves on the receiving end of a potential patent infringement complaint in district…

The Supreme Court confirmed that an unregistered patent licensee did have legal standing to file an infringement action in Spain when it filed such action as co-claimant to the patent holder. Case date: 08 February 2017 Case number: ATS 735/2017 Court: Supreme Court of Spain, First Civil Law Chamber A full summary of this case has been published…

Gilead Sciences vs Sandoz – Round One The history of the case started in 2018, where Gilead Sciences Inc., brought preliminary injunctions before the court against several companies. On 7 March 2018, the High Court of Eastern Denmark delivered a preliminary injunction against Accord Healthcare Limited, thereby reversing an earlier decision from the Danish Maritime…

Applying the so-called ‘Actavis Questions’ (further to the Supreme Court decision in Actavis v Eli Lilly), the Court of Appeal reached a different conclusion from the Patents Court on the issue of infringement. However, as the Court of Appeal upheld the first instance Court’s decision that the patent was invalid, this ultimately did not change…

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has affirmed a $139.8 million jury verdict in favor of Sprint Communications against Time Warner for infringement of five Sprint patents related to VoIP technology. The appeals court concluded that the district properly admitted evidence relating to the jury verdict in an earlier, related case brought…

In a Judgment dated 26 July 2018, the influential Barcelona Court of Appeal (Section 15) rejected an overly narrow, “literalistic” interpretation of a patent claim. A claim’s terms must be interpreted according to the meaning that a person skilled in the art would give them – even if it is not the most scientifically “puristic”…

The Court confirmed that a District court, not specialised in patent matters, does have relative jurisdiction to decide a motion to produce exhibits for determining patent infringement. In order to positively decide a motion to produce exhibits, (threat of) infringement should be made plausible, but the threshold for plausibility is relatively low. Further, technical details…