Stanford v Roche Likely to Spur Tighter Contracts

In a patent ownership dispute, the Supreme Court ruled on June 7 in favor of Roche and rejecting Stanford University's claim that Bayh-Dole “automatically vested title to federally funded research to the contractor. Instead, the Court stated that Bayh-Dole was limited to the relationship between the federal government and the contractor” and “could not be used to preempt the inventor’s rights.” Brian Kacedon, a partner at Finnegan, noted that the decision may put a greater burden on universities to police what their employees have done before and after they are hired, adding “I think one of the issues that comes up when you have people transferring employment, is just to make sure that if people are bringing technology with them, who owns that stuff they’re bringing with them? Is it something they can bring with them?”