All posts by: Robert Yarbrough

About Robert Yarbrough

Entire industries are built around the business model of a cheap product and expensive consumables for that product – think ink jet printers, electric toothbrushes and shaving razors.   Controlling replacement parts also is a lucrative sideline for manufacturers of big-ticket items – prime examples are automobile fenders and other collision repair parts. So why don’t […]

Now we know.  On December 22 the PTO experienced what it called a ‘catastrophic failure’ of the electronic patent and trademark filing and data systems due to a power outage.  The PTO technology staff worked through the Christmas holiday, and this writer can testify that the system was back up and receiving patent filings by […]

The Federal Trade Commission both announced charges of deception against Oracle and that those claims have been settled.  The claims relate to misleading statements made by Oracle relating to security vulnerabilities of the Java software.  Java is installed on 850 million personal computers, including yours.  Oracle represented to consumers that updates to the Java product corrected security […]

Most parties to litigation have to pay their own attorneys’ fees.   The patent statute includes an exception – in “exceptional” circumstances, the successful party in patent infringement litigation can collect attorneys’ fees from the losing party. Not every losing litigant is liable for the other party’s fees.  The reasonableness of the party’s litigation position and the unreasonableness […]

Apple and Samsung have been fighting for years over copying by Samsung of patented features of Apple’s iPhone and iPad.  The features at issue in a recent Apple v Samsung case before the Federal Circuit Court were swipe-to-unlock, telephone number recognition, and spelling correction.  A jury found that Samsung actively copied these features and infringed the patents […]

In Alice v CLS Bank, the Supreme Court determined that an abstract business method implemented by software entirely within a computer was not ‘patentable subject matter,’ meaning that the invention could not be protected by patent even though it met all of the requirements for a patent; namely, the process was novel, unobvious and had […]

‘Generalissimo Francisco Franco is Still Dead!’* At least insofar as patent licensing goes.  On June 22 the Supreme Court decided yet another patent case – this one relating to patent royalties after the patent expires.  In 1964, the Supreme Court in the Brulotte case determined that even with a contract, a patent owner cannot collect royalties for […]

“They’re baaack…”* *Heather Michele O’Rourke, ‘Poltergeist II,’ 1986 Congress, that is.  Several patent bills are pending, most of which will make it more risky and expensive to enforce a patent or defend against a patent infringement action in court.  These bills represent the second half of the America Invents Act, which changed the patent landscape […]

Google is running what it calls a ‘patent purchase promotion.’  From May 8 through May 22, 2015, you can offer to sell your issued U.S. patent to Google.  You must provide the patent number, contact information and a take-it-or-leave-it price along with the submission contract.  Google will let you know if it is interested by […]