Supreme Court Restricts the Extraterritorial Reach of U.S. Patent Law for Exported Goods - On February 22, 2017, the Supreme Court in a landmark decision held that the supply of a single component of a multicomponent...more
Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court issued two opinions on intellectual property issues. On March 21, 2017, the Court decided in a 7-1 opinion that laches is no longer a valid defense to a claim of patent infringement occurring...more
Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court decided two much anticipated intellectual property cases. Supreme Court Rejects Laches in Patent Infringement Cases - The first, SCA Hygiene Products Aktiebolag et al. v. First Quality...more
Until today, laches had been available as a defense in patent litigation without much debate. The defense often arose in the context of demand letters: a patentee would threaten an accused infringer, but would then wait...more
Though politics ruled the headlines in 2016, the year still brought big changes in intellectual property law and its application, most notably in patent subject matter eligibility, inter partes review institution and appeal...more
In a divided en banc decision in SCA Hygiene Products v. First Quality Baby Products, the Federal Circuit preserved the defense of laches for patent cases even though the Supreme Court eliminated that defense in copyright...more
Laches is an equitable defense based on a plaintiff’s unreasonable delay in pursuing a claim. In 2014, the Supreme Court effectively eliminated the laches defense in copyright cases, ruling that the copyright statute allows...more
Under Federal Circuit case law, patent-infringement defendants may assert the laches defense – an equitable defense barring claims brought after an unreasonable delay. But the doctrine will soon square off in the Federal...more