By John L. Rogitz of Rogitz & Associates1. Prior Inventorship Under 35 U.S.C. §102(g): Teva Pharmaceutical Indus. Ltd v. Astrazeneca Pharmaceuticals LLP, 2011-1091 affirms S/J of invalidity of Teva's statin patent over Astrazeneca's prior conception and reduction to practice because Astrazeneca made the drug and appreciated what it had made - a stable statin compound - although it did not appreciate which constituent was responsible for the stabilization. The prior inventor does not need to know everything about how or why its invention worked or conceive of it in the same words the patentee would later use in its claim.
2. Venue: In re Link_A_Media Devices Corp., misc. docket 990, grants a writ of mandamus to transfer a patent infringement case out of Delaware, where the accused infringer was incorporated, to the Northern District of California, where the accused infringer had its principal place of business. The patentee was a Bermuda holding company with a related entity in the ND California that employed the inventors of the patent in suit and which presumably housed all of the patentee's relevant documents. The district court, in denying transfer, under Third Circuit law had placed too much weight on the patentee's choice of forum and the accused infringer's state of incorporation. As to the former, "when a plaintiff brings its charges in a venue that is not its home forum, that choice of forum is entitled to less deference". The district cour...
