In In Re: AndroGel Antitrust Litigation (No. II), Northern District of Georgia Judge Thomas W. Thrash Jr. announced that, if the Eleventh Circuit remands the case, he would overturn the dismissal of the plaintiffs’ pay-for-delay claims given the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision. That case involved a Federal Trade Commission prosecution of the same settlement […]
Category Archives: Section 2 Standards
Judge Announces He Will Reverse Pay-for-Delay Dismissal Judgment If Appellate Court Remands In Light of Recent Supreme Court Decision
October 31, 2013 – 3:53 pm
Samsung Pledges to EU that It Will Use Circumspection in Seeking Injunctions for Infringement of Standard Essential Patents
October 31, 2013 – 3:50 pm
Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. has told the European Commission that it will limit attempts to enjoin infringers of its standard-essential patents for five years in exchange for the EC’s ending an antitrust investigation into the company’s assertion of its patents rights against Apple Inc. The Commission believes that Samsung sought to enjoin Apple, even though […]
Tenth Circuit Dismisses Software Developer’s Antitrust Suit Against Microsoft
October 18, 2013 – 1:56 pm
In Novell v. Microsoft Corp., Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed software developer Novell Inc.’s lawsuit against Microsoft Inc., alleging that Microsoft blocked Novell from the market in the 1990s by cutting compatibility with its applications. The ruling affirmed the lower court’s grant of summary judgment to Microsoft, holding that Novell couldn’t show that Microsoft’s […]
EU Fines Patented Drug Maker and Generics for Reverse Payment Settlement
September 8, 2013 – 11:43 am
The European Commission fined Lundbeck $125.6 million for paying its competitors, Merk KGaA, Ranbaxy Laboratories, and Xellia Pharmaceuticals, in 2002 to delay entering the market with generic versions of Lundbeck’s antidepressant citalopram. Joaquin Almunia, EC vice president for competition policy, explained that the Commission could not accept “that a company pays off its competitors to […]
US Supreme Court Permits Antitrust Challenges to Reverse Payment Settlements
September 8, 2013 – 11:40 am
In FTC v. Actavis, the U.S. Supreme Court held that a settlement in a patent infringement case in which the patent holder pays money to the alleged infringer not to introduce its product into the market could violate the antitrust laws under the Rule of Reason. The Court rejected the scope-of-the-patent doctrine that had been adopted […]
Pay-for-Delay Challenge to Move Forward
June 27, 2013 – 9:16 am
In In re: Skelaxin (Metaxalone) Antitrust Litigation, Eastern District of Tennessee Judge Curtis L. Collier denied a motion to dismiss multidistrict litigation accusing King Pharmaceuticals, a Pfizer subsidiary, and Mutual Pharmaceutical Co. Inc. of conspiring to keep generic versions of the muscle relaxer drug Skelaxin off the market. In 2005, King and Mutual settled infringement […]
Court Dismisses Antitrust Allegations Against C-SPAN
June 19, 2013 – 4:31 pm
In Sky Angel U.S. LLC v. National Cable Satellite Corp. d/b/a C-SPAN, District of Columbia Judge Rudolph Contreras dismissed Sky Angel’s antitrust suit against National Cable Satellite Corp. (C-SPAN). In its suit, Sky Angel, a Christian Internet television provider, claimed that C-SPAN violated §1 of the Sherman Act by pulling its programming from Sky Angel’s […]
Court Dismisses Multi-user Monopolization Case Against Microsoft
April 23, 2013 – 12:32 pm
In MiniFrame Ltd. v Microsoft Corp, Southern District of New York judge Richard J. Sullivan dismissed the plaintiff’s case, concluding that Microsoft’s Windows licensing rules and entry into the multi-user market did not constitute anti-competitive conduct and predatory pricing. MiniFrame provides a service that enables multiple users to access a single PC. It argued that […]
Patent Holder Seeks to Litigate Licensing Terms in State Court Under Recent Supreme Court Case
April 16, 2013 – 1:58 pm
In Gunn v. Minton, the United States Supreme Court held that patent-related legal malpractice suits should be heard in state court. Motorola has argued to the Federal Circuit that under the Court’s Gunn rationale that appellate court lacks jurisdiction over Apple’s appeal in a suit alleging that Motorola failed to license its patents on fair, […]