Patent Law Weblog
recent posts
- Apple v. Squires: USPTO Director Has Unlimited Discretion on IPR Institution
- The Ghost in the Machine: Why GenAI Can Be Both a Brilliant Researcher and a Terrible Advocate
- Bayer Files Suit Against Trio of COVID-19 Vaccine Makers
- Allen v. Cooper (4th Cir. 2026)
- To Require an Inventor ID, or Not to Require an Inventor ID – That Is the Question
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Category: Media Commentary
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By Kevin E. Noonan — With the U.S. Supreme Court set to consider the patent-eligibility of claims to isolated human DNA in AMP v. Myriad Genetics this morning, another aspect of Myriad’s control over BRCA testing technology is being contested. As reported on Friday by Gina Kolata in the New York Times ("DNA Project Aims…
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By Kevin E. Noonan — A large part of the debate on patenting genetic diagnostic method and isolated genes has revolved around the effects of such patents on what is loosely termed "personalized medicine." Personalized medicine can be summarized as a dream/holy grail/GATTACA future of universal genetic information — every infant having her genomic DNA…
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By Donald Zuhn — Last week, Forbes reported that the development costs for an average drug (produced by a major pharmaceutical company) are at least $4 billion, and as much as $11 billion ("The Truly Staggering Cost Of Inventing New Drugs"). The article, by Forbes science and medicine writer Matthew Herper, notes that the drug…
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By James DeGiulio — Pfizer's exclusive right to sell atorvastatin, the active pharmaceutical ingredient in the blockbuster cholesterol drug Lipitor, ended yesterday, November 30, the day generic competitors are licensed to enter the market as agreed upon during settlement of past patent litigations. It was a day the pharma giant has been dreading for quite…
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By Donald Zuhn — In an article published in The Huffington Post on Sunday, Wake Forest University Law Professor Simone Rose accuses the Federal Circuit of failing in its duty as "keeper of the Constitution" with respect to the Court's July 29 decision in Association for Molecular Pathology v. U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Noting…
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By James DeGiulio — Brand pharmaceutical companies are expecting a serious financial fallout sometime over the next few years, when several blockbuster drugs lose patent protection, commonly known as a "patent cliff." The loss in revenue could be substantial. From 2010 to 2013, brand pharmaceutical companies are projected to lose a total of $137 billion…
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By Kevin E. Noonan — The anti-patent virus seems to have moved across town in Manhattan, from the 8th Avenue editorial offices of The New York Times to 6th Avenue, from the aristocratic edifice ruled by the Sulzberger family to the business environs of the hardscrabble upstart Aussie, Rupert Murdoch at The Wall Street Journal. …
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By Kevin E. Noonan — The New York Times is at it again, proselytizing on its OpEd page about patents and how bad they are. This time the topic is the Supreme Court's upcoming argument in the Microsoft v. i4i case, involving the standard for determining whether the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office should be…
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By Kevin E. Noonan — George Will, conservative icon, wrote an Op-Ed piece in The Washington Post last week extolling the virtues (and the necessities) of innovation and government support for it ("Rev the scientific engine"). He takes issue with some of his conservative brethren that, in view of what he terms the "excesses" of…
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By Kevin E. Noonan — The staid Financial Times (London) has an article today on the gene patenting debate, and while there are things to criticize in it, the article (perhaps predictably) takes a carefully measured, dispassionate (and welcome) tone ("Who steals the gene from off the common"; free registration required). The paper's conservative bona…
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