On July 13, 2020, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, in Mich. Motor Techs., v. Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft, No. 19-10485, granted Volkswagen’s motion to dismiss Michigan Motor Technologies’...more
In Halo Electronics, Inc. v. Pulse Electronics, Inc.,1 the Supreme Court held that 35 U.S.C. Section 284 provides for enhanced damages in egregious cases...more
Enhanced Damages Under the Patent Act - The Patent Act provides that once infringement has been established, a district court may “increase the damages up to three times the amount found or assessed.” 35 U.S.C. § 284. The...more
Just over a year ago, the Supreme Court issued its decision in Halo Electronics, Inc. v. Pulse Electronics, Inc., 136 S. Ct. 1923 (2016). Halo abrogated the Federal Circuit’s two-part willfulness test, which the Federal...more
Historically, patent owners have pled willful infringement in an effort to support the collection of enhanced damages from an infringer. Typically, if there was willful infringement the damages were enhanced and often...more
Federal Circuit After Stryker/Halo - Why it matters: On June 13, 2016, the U.S. Supreme Court decided the consolidated cases of Stryker Corp. v. Zimmer, Inc. and Halo Electronics, Inc. v. Pulse Electronics, Inc. and, as...more
Claims Directed to Monitoring and Analyzing Data Held to Be Invalid under § 101 - In Electric Power Group, LLC v. Alstom S.A., Appeal No. 2015-1778, the Federal Circuit upheld the district court’s grant of summary...more
On remand from the Supreme Court’s decision in Halo Elecs., Inc. v. Pulse Elecs., Inc., 136 S. Ct. 1923 (2016), the Federal Circuit recently issued a revised decision in Stryker Corp. v. Zimmer, Inc., No. 2013-1668 (Fed. Cir....more
Supreme Court Expands Discretion to Award Enhanced Damages for Patent Infringement and Eliminates the Federal Circuit’s ‘Seagate Test’ - In Halo Electronics, Inc. v. Pulse Electronics, Inc., the U.S. Supreme Court...more
Patent holders have faced a number of new challenges to successfully enforce their patent rights over the last several years. The creation and implementation of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board and inter partes review...more
On June 13, 2016, the U.S. Supreme Court again reversed a decision of the Federal Circuit—the Circuit specially designated to hear all patent appeals—this time, in articulating the test for determining whether to award...more
Patent infringement plaintiffs and defendants alike fret over enhanced damages: Section 284 of the Patent Act, the basis for enhanced damages, provides that a court may grant a damages award up to three times actual damages....more
Up until now, it has been nearly impossible for a plaintiff to recover enhanced (up to treble) damages in patent infringement cases. The current test for enhanced damages, set forth by the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals in...more
The Supreme Court of the United States traced two centuries of analysis related to enhanced damages in patent cases to conclude that the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit’s two-part test, announced nearly a decade...more
Cuozzo Speed Technologies, LLC v. Lee (No. 2015-446, 6/20/16) (Roberts, Kennedy, Thomas, Ginsburg, Breyer, Alito, Sotomayor, Kagan) - June 20, 2016 12:49 PM - Breyer, J. Affirming Federal Circuit decision that the...more
On June 13, 2016 Chief Justice Roberts delivered a unanimous decision of the Supreme Court in the case of Halo v. Pulse on the question of when enhanced damages can be awarded for patent infringement. This decision reversed...more
Section 284 of the Patent Act provides that, in the event of damages for patent infringement, “the court may increase the damages up to three times the amount found or assessed.” In 2007, the Federal Circuit in In re Seagate...more
On June 13, 2016, the Supreme Court issued a unanimous opinion in two consolidated cases (Halo Electronics v. Pulse Electronics and Stryker Corp. v. Zimmer) effectively lowering the standard for obtaining enhanced damages in...more
In a relatively rare “pro-patent” decision, the U.S. Supreme Court earlier this week unanimously overruled the Federal Circuit’s so-called Seagate standard for finding willful patent infringement and awarding enhanced...more
On Monday, in a significant victory for patent owners, the U.S. Supreme Court swept away the Federal Circuit’s “inelastic” framework for assessing enhanced patent damages and found that 35 U.S.C. § 284 means what it says:...more
On June 13, 2016, in Halo Electronics, Inc. v. Pulse Electronics, Inc., 579 U.S. ___ (2016), the Supreme Court unanimously abrogated the Federal Circuit’s 2007 decision in In re Seagate Tech., LLC, 497 F.3d 1360 (Fed. Cir....more
On June 13, 2016, in a much-anticipated joint holding in Halo/Stryker, [1] the Supreme Court unanimously overturned the Federal Circuit’s rigid test for willful infringement under Seagate and conferred discretion on district...more
In recent years, the Supreme Court has repeatedly rejected the Federal Circuit’s strict tests concerning monetary relief in patent cases in favor of more fluid standards that commit discretion to the district courts. In...more
Section 284 of The Patent Act provides that in a case of infringement, courts “may increase the damages up to three times the amount found or assessed.” Under Seagate, to be entitled to enhanced damages under § 284, a patent...more
Patent infringers take note: clever defenses by ingenious litigation counsel may come too late to save you from an award of exemplary damages. On Monday, June 13, in Halo Electronics v. Pulse Electronics and Stryker Corp. v....more