Moreover, "Patent Docs" is the personal weblog of the Authors; it is not edited by the Authors' employers or clients and, as such, no part of this weblog may be so attributed. The harm flowing from foreign uses in this case appears to outstrip wildly the harm inflicted by ION’s domestic production: the jury awarded $93.4 million in lost profits from uses in 10 foreign surveys but only $12.5 million in royalties for 2,500 U. S.-made products. Today’s decision unfortunately forecloses further consideration of these points. At trial, ION was found to have infringed the asserted claims under 35 U.S.C. As this Court has explained, the “overriding purpose” of §284 is to “affor[d] patent owners complete compensation” for infringements. Applying these principles here, we conclude that the conduct relevant to the statutory focus in this case is domestic. See id., at ___ (slip op., at 18). Ibid. §105 (addressing inventions made, used, and sold in outer space), nothing in the Patent Act fairly suggests that it has taken that step here. Awarded the National Press Club's Breaking News Award for coverage of the Affordable Care Act decision. In sum, the focus of §284 in a case involving infringement under §271(f)(2) is on the act of exporting components from the United States. . (a) The presumption against extraterritoriality assumes that federal statutes “apply only within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States.” Foley Bros., Inc. v. Filardo, 336 U. S. 281, 285. Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States, Washington, D. C. 20543, of any typographical or other formal errors, in order that corrections may be made before the preliminary print goes to press. (“[G]eneral words must . The general infringement provision, §271(a), covers most infringements that occur “within the United States.” The subsection at issue in this case, §271(f ), “expands the definition of infringement to include supplying from the United States a patented invention’s components.” Microsoft Corp. v. AT&T Corp., 550 U. S. 437, 444–445 (2007). Section 271(f )(1) addresses the act of exporting a substantial portion of an invention’s components: “Whoever without authority supplies or causes to be supplied in or from the United States all or a substantial portion of the components of a patented invention, where such components are uncombined in whole or in part, in such manner as to actively induce the combination of such components outside of the United States in a manner that would infringe the patent if such combination occurred within the United States, shall be liable as an infringer.”. . Their position wrongly conflates legal injury with the damages arising from that injury. General Motors Corp., supra, at 655. Accordingly, the infringement is plainly the focus of §284. Specifically, the company complains that it lost lucrative foreign surveying contracts because ION’s customers used its invention overseas to steal that business. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can leave if you wish. WesternGeco certainly thinks it does. This recovery can include lost profits. 2019), New from Abroad -- Bill to Modify Chile's Industrial Property Law », Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences. In measuring its damages, WesternGeco assumes it could have charged monopoly rents abroad premised on a U. S. patent that has no legal force there. Co. v. Sargent, 117 U. S. 536 (1886), the patent owner “availed himself of his exclusive right by keeping his patent a monopoly” and selling the invention himself. On Tuesday, the justices heard oral argument in California v. Texas. Cir. § 284, and the Court therefore reversed the Federal Circuit's reversal of the award of lost profits damages and remanded the case (see "WesternGeco LLC v. ION Geophysical Corp. (2018)"). It would allow greater recovery when a defendant exports a component of an invention in violation of §271(f )(2) than when a defendant exports the entire invention in violation of §271(a). Awarded the American Gavel Award for Distinguished Reporting About the Judiciary to recognize the highest standards of reporting about courts and the justice system. A defendant must “compensate the patentee,” the Court continued, only to the extent that it has “com[e] in competition with the [patent owner] where the [patent owner] was entitled to the exclusive use” of his invention—namely, within the United States. Earlier this month, the Federal Circuit decided, given the intervening invalidation of four of the five asserted patent claims by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office's Patent Trial and Appeal Board, to remand the case back to the District Court for further proceedings on the lost profits award. For respondent: Kannon K. Shanmugam, Washington, D. C. Judgment REVERSED and case REMANDED. By failing to heed the plain text of the Patent Act and the lessons of our precedents, the Court ends up assuming that patent damages run (literally) to the ends of the earth. SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES . Under §284, damages are “adequate” to compensate for infringement when they “plac[e] [the patent owner] in as good a position as he would have been in” if the patent had not been infringed.
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