Supreme Court Continues to Address Patent Concerns

The Supreme Court has taken on another possibly landscape-changing patent case that will determine if patent holders are able to sue everyone up and down the food chain for a patent infringement. "This case, officially between LG and Quanta, really concerns the question of how many times patent holders can get a cut of any component found violating a patent. Currently, patent holders will often sue up and down the food chain. So, if you happen to have a patent on a component within a motor that is used in automobile wipers, you could sue the motor maker, the wiper maker and the auto manufacturer -- and get all three to pay, even though the same product is used throughout the supply chain. This case will look at whether or not it makes sense to allow for that type of double, triple or quadruple dipping."

Comments

What does the patent claim?

[Valdrax]

The real problem is who do you have to sue based on what your patent claims.

Let's take the example used in the summary of a component used in a motor in a windshield wiper blade. What does the new component do that made it patentable?

- Is the innovation purely in the use in a motor? (Reducing wear and tear?)
- Or maybe is the innovation in its effect on the wiper? (A smoother wiping motion with less noise?)
- Or maybe is the innovation in how the car performs? (Allowing a more aerodynamically friendly wiper?)

What if the patented item does all three and claims all three things? Does a SCOTUS decision ruling that you can only collect once open the door for a finger-pointing exercise between defendants (something the courts like to avoid) in trying assign infringement? Does going straight to the bottom of the supply chain always make sense? (For example, what if it doesn't do anything for the motor itself but only for the higher level functions?)

These are very important balance issues that the SCOTUS will have to consider.