CAFC News Brief

Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corporation V. Msn Pharmaceuticals, Inc., decided 4 Dec 24

Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corporation appealed a district court's denial of a preliminary injunction against MSN Pharmaceuticals, Inc., preventing the launch of MSN's generic version of Entresto. The dispute centered on whether MSN's product infringed Novartis's patent for an amorphous form of a compound. The district court found Novartis did not demonstrate a likelihood of success on the merits because conflicting expert evidence existed regarding the presence of the patented amorphous form in MSN's product. The court also found that Novartis failed to prove irreparable harm. The appeals court affirmed the district court’s decision, finding no clear error in its factual findings and holding that the evidence did not support granting the injunction. The court also expressed concern about the district court's claim construction but deemed any error harmless due to the insufficiency of evidence of infringement.

Mirror Worlds Technologies, LLC v. Meta Platforms, Inc., decided 4 Dec 24

This CAFC opinion concerns a patent infringement lawsuit filed by Mirror Worlds Technologies against Meta Platforms (formerly Facebook). Mirror Worlds claimed that Facebook's News Feed, Timeline, and Activity Log features infringed on their patents for chronologically organizing data on a computer system. The district court granted summary judgment to Meta, finding no infringement. The appeals court affirmed this decision, upholding the district court's claim construction and finding insufficient evidence to demonstrate that Meta's systems met all the limitations of the patents at issue. Because the patents had expired, the court dismissed Meta's cross-appeal regarding patent invalidity.

DoggyPhone LLC v. Tomofun LLC, decided 21 Nov 24

The case is about DoggyPhone's patent infringement lawsuit against Tomofun. The lower court granted summary judgment to Tomofun, finding its "Furbo" device did not infringe DoggyPhone's patent for a remote pet communication system. The appellate court affirmed, focusing on the key claim limitation requiring transmission initiation in response to pet input. The court held that the Furbo's user-initiated transmission, triggered by a notification, did not satisfy this limitation, thus supporting the non-infringement ruling. The court did not need to address the other two grounds for summary judgment.

Cellspin Soft, Inc. v. Fitbit LLC, et al. (Fed. Cir. No. 23-1526), decided 01 Nov 2024

This case is about Cellspin Soft, Inc.'s appeal of a district court's denial of its motion to recuse Judge Gonzalez Rogers and vacate summary judgment rulings in patent infringement cases against Fitbit and Nikon. The appeals court dismissed the appeal concerning Nikon due to procedural issues. Regarding Fitbit, the court affirmed the denial of the recusal motion, finding Cellspin's arguments untimely and any potential error harmless because the summary judgment against Cellspin on the merits was independently affirmed in similar cases. The court determined that even if the judge's impartiality was questionable, the outcome of Cellspin's case would not change. Therefore, the court dismissed the appeal concerning Nikon and affirmed the district court's decision concerning Fitbit.

Cellspin Soft, Inc. v. Fitbit LLC, et al., (Fed. Cir. No. 22-2025), decided 01 Nov 24

The CAFC affirms a district court's grant of summary judgment for Fitbit, Nike, Under Armour, Fossil, Nikon, and Garmin in a patent infringement lawsuit brought by Cellspin Soft, Inc. Cellspin alleged infringement of three patents related to automatically uploading multimedia content via Bluetooth-enabled devices. The appeals court found that Cellspin failed to demonstrate a genuine dispute of material fact regarding several claim limitations, including the requirement of a continuous paired connection and the proper attachment of user identifiers. The court upheld the district court's exclusion of Cellspin's late-introduced evidence. The court ultimately affirmed the judgment of non-infringement for all defendants.

NexStep, Inc. v. Comcast Cable Communications, LLC, decided 24 Oct 24

This case is about NexStep's patent infringement lawsuit against Comcast. The court affirmed the lower court's judgment of non-infringement for two patents, one related to a "digital butler" and the other to a "concierge device." The court upheld the lower court's claim construction of "VoIP" and its judgment as a matter of law regarding the "concierge device" patent, finding NexStep's expert testimony insufficient. A concurring/dissenting opinion disagreed with the judgment as a matter of law, arguing that sufficient evidence supported the jury's finding of infringement under the doctrine of equivalents for the "concierge device" patent.

Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson v. Lenovo (United States), Inc., decided 24 Oct 24

This case involves a dispute between Ericsson and Lenovo concerning 5G standard-essential patents (SEPs) and FRAND commitments. Lenovo sought an antisuit injunction to prevent Ericsson from enforcing injunctions obtained in Colombia and Brazil. The Federal Circuit vacated the lower court’s denial of the injunction, finding the lower court erred in its interpretation of the "dispositive" requirement for antisuit injunctions. The court held that the issue of whether Ericsson had fulfilled its good-faith negotiation obligations under the FRAND commitment was dispositive of the propriety of the foreign injunctions.

UTTO Inc. v. Metrotech Corp., decided 18 Oct 24

In this case, UTTO Inc. sued Metrotech Corp. for infringement of a patent related to detecting buried assets, and for tortious interference with prospective economic advantage. The district court dismissed both claims. The appeals court vacated the dismissal of the patent infringement claim, finding the district court's claim construction insufficient and requiring further analysis. However, the appeals court affirmed the dismissal of the tortious interference claim due to insufficient allegations of wrongful conduct by Metrotech.

CAO Lighting, Inc. v. Feit Electric Company, Inc., decided 16 Oct 24

CAO Lighting sued Feit Electric for patent infringement regarding a semiconductor light source. The district court granted summary judgment for Feit Electric, based on a claim construction requiring the "first reflective layer" to be an epitaxial layer and different from the substrate. The Federal Circuit reversed, finding the district court's claim construction erroneous because it improperly limited the definition of "reflective layer". The appellate court vacated the summary judgment and remanded the case for further proceedings consistent with its opinion, clarifying that the "first reflective layer" need not be an epitaxial layer distinct from the substrate. The appellate court awarded costs to CAO Lighting.

Heidary v. Amazon.com, Inc., Ring, LLC, decided 15 Oct 24

Massoud Heidary's patent infringement lawsuit against Amazon and Ring was dismissed. The CAFC affirmed the dismissal, finding improper venue because Ring, a Delaware LLC, lacked a Maryland presence as required. Further, the court held that Heidary failed to adequately plead direct patent infringement, as his complaint insufficiently linked the accused products to his patented fire protection system. Because direct infringement was not established, the induced infringement claim also failed. The dismissal was upheld despite Heidary's pro se status.