Supreme Court's Fall Docket: Insider Trading, Samsung v. Apple, and Adult Diapers

In a review of the Supreme Court's upcoming Fall docket, Forbes contacted Finnegan attorney J. Michael Jakes for his thoughts on the intellectual property cases that the high court plans to hear. In Samsung v. Apple, the case revolves around design patents and whether infringers are ordered to give up the total profits earned from the product, even if only one feature of the design infringed. Jakes said, "It's going to come down to a statutory language argument. Even if people have a more restricted view of what patents are worth, it's a fairly broad statute."

In Life Technologies v. Promega, Life Technologies shipped a non-infringing biotech compound to a UK subsidiary, and the UK subsidiary then created an infringing product that was imported back into the United States. Congress passed a law that held exporters liable for components they ship overseas with the intention of being combined into infringing products and shipped back to the United, however, the law is quite broad and they left it up to courts to interpret what it means. Jakes said, "...if you're really supplying a commodity chemical and don't know what they're doing with it, there won't be inducement."