News

Here is a report on recent news and commentary related to the Federal Circuit and its cases. Today’s report highlights:

  • an article about a Federal Circuit decision finding “[a] Texas federal court ‘clearly abused its discretion’ when declining to transfer a patent-infringement lawsuit against Google LLC”;
  • another article about the Federal Circuit “vacat[ing] what it called an ‘extraordinarily high’ legal-fee award of $185 million”; and
  • a third article about how a “Virginia federal judge issued a bench trial ruling Monday that ImmunoGen is not entitled to a patent on a cancer treatment . . . after the Federal Circuit vacated the court’s previous decision and ordered a trial.”

Kelcee Griffis wrote an article for Bloomberg Law about a Federal Circuit decision finding the Western District of Texas “‘clearly abused its discretion’ when declining to transfer a patent-infringement lawsuit against Google LLC.” Griffis highlighted how “Jawbone Innovations Inc. sued tech companies including Google, Apple Inc., and Amazon.com Inc. in separate Texas federal lawsuits,” and how, despite Amazon’s case being transferred to the Northern District of California, Judge Albright did not grant Google’s request for transfer to the same court. Griffis reported how the Federal Circuit granted a writ of mandamus ordering transfer in In re Google LLC.

Mike Scarcella authored an article for Reuters about the Federal Circuit “vacat[ing] what it called an ‘extraordinarily high’ legal-fee award of $185 million for law firm Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan.” Scarcella explained how the legal fee award followed a “$3.7 billion settlement with the U.S. government” involving litigation over “a key provision of the federal Affordable Care Act.” Scarcella reported how “the Federal Circuit said a lower court judge ‘did not adequately justify’ $185 million in fees” and “the analysis of the fee award was ‘inconsistent’ with the terms of notices sent to class members in the case.”

Craig Clough wrote an article for Law360 about how a “Virginia federal judge issued a bench trial ruling . . . that ImmunoGen is not entitled to a patent on a cancer treatment . . . after the Federal Circuit vacated the court’s previous decision and ordered a trial.” Clough reported how the Virginia federal judge “reached the same conclusion as the court’s 2021 summary judgment decision that went against ImmunoGen in its lawsuit against the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office,” finding the patent claims to be “unpatentable as indefinite and obvious.” Clough highlighted how the court’s reasoning centered around ImmunoGen “seeking a double patent, with the application attempting to cover a dosing regimen for an already patented drug.”