Patent Baristas

The Japanese Government’s IP Strategic Headquarters announced plans to revise the patent examination standards for medical inventions of known drug compounds. The new standard will grant patent protection for new and inventive dosage regimens and modes of administration as a “product-related invention” provided the claimed medicament has remarkable effects beyond that which is expected by […]

The Innovation Alliance announced the release of a new study that details what it says is the negative impact on the U.S. economy that would result from enactment of currently considered patent legislation. The new study: “Problems to be Expected from Expanded Administrative Challenges to U.S. Patents,” is authored by Scott Shane, Ph.D., Professor of […]

Now, provisional exclusive and/or non-exclusive licenses can be registered at the Japan Patent Office based on a license agreement effective before an application is granted a patent. The new recordation system will provide protection for the licensee regarding the pending patent application against any third party who subsequently acquires the right to the license to […]

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has acknowledges that it might have been miscalculating patent term adjustment (PTA) for patents issued from 35 U.S.C. 371 national stage filings. Fish & Richardson and their pharmaceutical client Japan Tobacco Inc. (JT) discovered a significant error in the manner by which the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) […]

Innovation patents are second tier patents similar to utility models, having a lower threshold for patentability and a relatively short term of eight years compared to standard patents. A recent appeal court decision confirms that inventions that include features that are known and obvious can still sustain valid innovation patent protection in Australia. The Decision […]

The saga of the PTO’s rulemaking authority continued on March 20, 2009 when the Federal Circuit issued its 55 page decision in Tafas v. Doll holding that aside from the rule limiting continuations, the other rule changes were procedural in nature and the PTO does have the rule-making authority to implement the rules limiting the […]

Earlier, the Australian courts were asked consider the meaning of “the filing date of the complete application” in clause 2.2(1A) of the Patents Regulations 1991 in the context of a divisional application. (Mont Adventure Equipment Pty Limited v Phoenix Leisure Group Pty Limited [2008] FCA 1476) In the case at hand, the Applicant, Mont Adventure, […]

A recent decision of an Australian appeal court concerning a patent for an enantiomer pharmaceutical dealt with matters of patent claim validity and patent term extension. The decision, H Lundbeck A/S v Alphapharm Pty Ltd [2009] FCAFC 70, involves a decision of the Full Federal Court on rehearing an appeal by Alphapharm over an earlier […]