Supreme Court weakens clout of "obvious" patents - impact on paintball industry?

[BobTheCow]

from http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?p...8pE&refer=home

Top U.S. Court Clears Way for More Patent Challenges (Update1)
By Greg Stohr

April 30 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. Supreme Court made it easier to challenge patents for failing to introduce genuine innovations, siding with Intel Corp. and Cisco Systems Inc. and dealing a setback to the drug and biotechnology industries.

The justices today unanimously overturned a decades-old test used by the lower court that handles patent appeals, saying the lower court went too far to shield patents from legal attack. The ruling threw out a Teleflex Inc. lawsuit that accuses KSR International Inc. of using a patented invention for adjustable gas pedals.

The decision extends a Supreme Court trend that has put new limits on patent rights. In today's case, the justices heeded arguments from large computer companies and automakers that the lower court test, which centered on the requirement that an invention be ``non-obvious,'' had given too much power to developers of trivial technological improvements.

``Granting patent protection to advances that would occur in the ordinary course without real innovation retards progress,'' Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote for the court.

In a second ruling today, the court gave software makers new protections from patent lawsuits on exports, ruling that Microsoft Corp. doesn't owe damages to AT&T Inc. for copies of the Windows operating system installed on computers overseas.

Invalid Patent

The gas-pedal case concerned claims that a patent was invalid because it simply combined prior inventions. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit had required challengers to show a ``teaching, suggestion or motivation'' -- typically in writing -- to put the earlier inventions together.

Companies that are frequent targets of patent-infringement claims urged the Supreme Court to overturn the Federal Circuit test. The group included Intel, Cisco, Microsoft, Time Warner Inc., Viacom Inc., Micron Technology Inc. and automakers General Motors Corp., Ford Motor Co. and DaimlerChrysler AG.

Other companies, more concerned about protecting their own patents, took the opposite side in the case. General Electric Co., 3M Co., Procter & Gamble Co., DuPont Co., Johnson & Johnson and trade groups for the brand-name drug and biotech industries signed briefs backing Teleflex in the case.

The disputed Teleflex patent covers an electronic sensor combined with gas, brake or clutch pedals that adjust to the height of the driver. Teleflex says its method took less space than previous combinations.

KSR, based in Ridgetown, Ontario, makes adjustable pedals for GM's Chevrolet and GMC trucks and sport-utility vehicles.

Too Obvious

A federal judge in Detroit ruled the technology was too obvious to qualify for a patent. The Federal Circuit in Washington revived the suit, ordering the judge to reconsider whether the patent was valid.

Teleflex argued that the Federal Circuit standard avoided the problem of ``perfect hindsight'' by requiring proof that an innovation was obvious at the time it was created.

Teleflex, based in Limerick, Pennsylvania, sold its auto- pedal business in August 2005 to DriveSol Worldwide, an affiliate of Sun Capital Partners Inc., a private investment firm based in Boca Raton, Florida. Sun Capital has taken over the case.

The case is KSR International v. Teleflex, 04-1350.

To contact the reporter on this story: Greg Stohr in Washington at [email protected] .
Last Updated: April 30, 2007 11:07 EDT

I'm not as familiar as I'd like to be with patent law or, for that matter, the state of the paintball industry today. Is it possible that this will alleviate some of the stress that has been caused by frivolous patents clogging the industry over the past several years? With the "obvious" electronic/trigger patents that I seem to remember being a problem for certain companies recently, maybe it will be easier to free up new designs and independent creativity and productivity again.

Or maybe I'm just spewing crap that I know nothing about. Thoughts?

[SummaryJudgement]

Very interesting. I always thought that the SP patent for an "electropneumatically operated paintball gun" (or whatever) seemed terribly vauge. Especially when it allowed them to sue another sompany or cause them to stop production on something.

There have been electronic switches, power sources, hoses, and solenoids used to drive some sort of mechanical operation/movement for what, seventy to a hundred years? The fact they were combined in such a way to open a valve and propel a paintball never seemed like something worthy of a patent. Now if it were some specific design of valve, solenoid, ram, etc. I could understand patenting something like that. I guess I had a problem with the patenting of a too free-form "concept".

Good find!

[Ninjeff]

im sure someone can clear this up. Im interested too.

[txaggie08]

This could get good, especialy with them starting to jack with NPS over the mini. They'll get away with it till they go after a big name.....and the big name is liable to see the course through and stop this nonsense....

[punkncat]

This could get good, especialy with them starting to jack with NPS over the mini. They'll get away with it till they go after a big name.....and the big name is liable to see the course through and stop this nonsense....

The people behind the Mini are large enough to take it all the way, should they deem it finacially sound to do so. The problem isn't that many of the other companies that pay royalties couldn't have fought it, it was just better finacially to play along.

[WalkingTarget]

the fact of the matter is though, that if one case is won against Smart Parts, it will open the proberbial door, and this new ruling will make several cases quite in-and-out.

it may be the case that this new ruling will have such non-specific patents as their EP-marker patents thrown out the door.

i believe that currently the Gardener Bros. are starting to draft patents for *all* EP designs hedging against that day, so when their patent does get thrown to the floor, they can re-submint for the intelectual property of all other manufacturers, thus re-securing their hold on the EP market.... that's what i would do in their position...

[BigEvil]

Very interesting. I always thought that the SP patent for an "electropneumatically operated paintball gun" (or whatever) seemed terribly vauge. Especially when it allowed them to sue another sompany or cause them to stop production on something.

There have been electronic switches, power sources, hoses, and solenoids used to drive some sort of mechanical operation/movement for what, seventy to a hundred years? The fact they were combined in such a way to open a valve and propel a paintball never seemed like something worthy of a patent. Now if it were some specific design of valve, solenoid, ram, etc. I could understand patenting something like that. I guess I had a problem with the patenting of a too free-form "concept".

Good find!

Well thats what they mean by applying the 'obvious test' to a patent. I bet there are a ton of paintball patents that wouldnt get past it. Reprogramable contoller boards? HA

[CoolHand]

. . . . . i believe that currently the Gardener Bros. are starting to draft patents for *all* EP designs hedging against that day, so when their patent does get thrown to the floor, they can re-submint for the intelectual property of all other manufacturers, thus re-securing their hold on the EP market.... that's what i would do in their position...

IIRC once an unpatented item is sold on the open market for a year ( I think it's a year) that item is no longer patentable (unless you had patent pending status before you started selling them). That is specifically to prevent someone from patenting someone else's idea after it's already gone to market.

[edweird]

Granting patent protection to advances that would occur in the ordinary course without real innovation retards progress,''

QFT!

[Ydna]

The fact they were combined in such a way to open a valve and propel a paintball never seemed like something worthy of a patent.

Well, the point is that it's currently not innovative. Back in the day it was definitely a patentable product. The issue is, though, that it's no longer an innovation to have an electronic marker.
It'd be as if there were a patent on the automobile. It would have made sense the year the automobile was invented, but is no longer an innovative product.

However, regardless of that, everybody has to remember that SPs most recent lawsuits didn't involve the "electro" patent. They involved other design traits.

[hitech]

One thing to remember, someone still has to file suit, or be able to afford fighting a lawsuit in court. And they are expensive. At least now they have a better chance of winning. Maybe other companies will win enough to set some easily followable president law. But it will all take time, and money...

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