Source: http://sullivanlaw.net/
Timestamp: 2019-04-18 18:22:23+00:00

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support the use of 28 USC § 1498, a federal statute that allows the federal government intentionally to infringe patents, to arrange for production of Gilead Sciences’s patented hepatitis C drugs. Beth Mole, There’s a federal law to lower drug prices—and Louisiana may just use it, ArsTechnica (May 4, 2017).
28 USC § 1498 has been the subject of several recent rulings in which the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has upheld a broad reading of the protection afforded by the law to government contractors. See, e.g., Astornet Technologies, Inc. v. BAE Systems, Inc., 802 F.3d 1271 (Fed. Cir. 2015); IRIS Corp. v. Japan Airlines Corp., 769 F.3d 1359 (Fed. Cir. 2014); and Zoltek Corp. v. United States, 672 F.3d 1309 (Fed. Cir. 2012).
On May 2, 2016, California Berry Cultivars, LLC (CBC) sued the University of California, Davis for breach of contract, conversion, breach of fiduciary duty, and unfair competition in connection with the flagship agricultural university’s management of strawberry varieties developed by its scientists. Verified Complaint, California Berry Cultivars, LLC v. Regents of the University of California, No. RG16813870 (Cal. Super. Ct. Alameda Cty 2016).
CBC claims that its members, former UC Davis plant breeders Doug Shaw and Kirk Larson, developed approximately 168 cultivars that are the subjects of pending patent applications and another approximately 250 varieties that “may have value as breeding stock.” According to the complaint, Shaw and Larson have assigned to CBC all of their non-patent rights in the germplasm.
CBC alleges that it has attempted to obtain licenses to the germplasm from UC Davis, but claims that the university has made the varieties unavailable to CBC and other California agribusinesses “in an apparent attempt to suppress competition.” CBC contends that UC Davis’s alleged refusal to license the germplasm conflicts with agreements that Shaw and Larson entered into with the university when they were its employees, as well as with a 2015 settlement agreement between the California Strawberry Commission and UC Davis, in which the university agreed to keep its strawberry breeding program public.
In addition to asking for damages and injunctive relief against the university, CBC has asked the court immediately to enjoin UC Davis to deliver five plants of each cultivar in question to CBC or to an escrow agent pending resolution of the case.
On May 6, 2016, the university removed the case to the U.S. District Court.
On October 8, 2015, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled that a sequence of yoga poses and breathing exercises was not entitled to copyright protection under the U.S. Copyright Act. Bikram’s Yoga College of India v. Evolation Yoga, No. 13-55763 (9th Cir. Oct. 8, 2015).
PLAINTIFFS’ CLAIMS. The plaintiffs contended that the yoga sequences in question–26 poses and two breathing exercises developed by Bikram Choudhury and described in his book Bikram’s Beginning Yoga Class–were entitled to copyright protection as a choreographic work. Since the enactment of the 1976 Copyright Act, “pantomimes and choreographic works” have been eligible for copyright protection. However, the court determined that although the poses and exercises possessed aesthetic attributes, “at bottom, the Sequence is an idea, process, or system designed to improve health.” For this reason, the court concluded that the sequence was ineligible for copyright protection under 17 U.S.C. § 102(b).
THE IDEA/EXPRESSION DICHOTOMY. Section 102(b) of the Copyright Act expressly excludes protection for “any idea, procedure, process, system, method of operation, concept, principle, or discovery, regardless of the form in which it is described, explained, illustrated, or embodied in such work.” This statute codifies the well-known “idea/expression dichotomy”–the principle that copyright protects only the expression of an idea, but does not award exclusive rights as to the underlying idea itself. Other courts have invoked the idea/expression dichotomy to deny copyright protection to process-ideas such as meditation exercises, see Palmer v. Braun, 287 F. 3d 1325 (11th Cir. 2002), food recipes, see Publications International, Ltd. v. Meredith Corp., 88 F. 3d 473 (9th Cir. 1996), and a manual describing how to organize roller-skating races, see Seltzer v. Sunbrock, 22 F. Supp. 621 (S.D. Cal. 1938).
The Sequence is not copyrightable as a choreographic work for the same reason that it is not copyrightable as a compilation: it is an idea, process,or system to which copyright protection may“[i]n no case” extend. 17 U.S.C.§102(b). We recognize that the Sequence may involve“static and kinetic successions of bodily movement in certain rhythmic and spatial relationships.” Compendium II,§ 450.01. So too would a method to churn butter or drill for oil. That is no accident: “successions of bodily movement”often serve basic functional purposes. Such movements do not become copyrightable as “choreographic works” when they are part and parcel of a process. Even if the Sequence could fit within some colloquial definitions of dance or choreography, it remains a process ineligible for copyright protection.
The idea/expression dichotomy … plays a similar role in defining the scope of protection for a choreographic work as it does for compilations…. In the context of choreographic works, that role is essential. Our day-to-day lives consist of many routinized physical movements, from brushing one’s teeth to pushing a lawnmower to shaking a Polaroid picture that could be … characterized as forms of dance. Without a proper understanding of the idea/expression dichotomy, one might obtain monopoly rights over these functional physical sequences by describing them in a tangible medium of expression and labeling them choreographic works. The idea/expression dichotomy thus ensures that expansive interpretations of the categories enumerated as proper subjects of copyright will, “[i]n no case,” extend copyright protection beyond its constitutional limits. 17 U.S.C. §102(b).
In July 2015, a court in the city of Milan, Italy held that the Italian subsidiary of BASF failed to establish its ownership of plant variety rights in a lawsuit that BASF brought against a local company. BASF Italia S.p.A. v. Società Agricola Magnani Caterina e Magnani Lorenza, No. 8745/15 (Ct. Milan, Bus. Chamber A, 16 July 2015).
BASF Italia sued Società Agricola Magnani, alleging that it infringed European patents relating to its Clearfield® rice planting system and plant variety rights held by BASF in the variety POLLUX CL, a rice variety said to be especially resistant to imidazolinone herbicides. BASF first obtained, through ex parte proceedings, an order to search Magnani’s fields and to inspect rice seedlings and seeds found there. Subsequently, it sought an injunction and damages against Magnani for alleged patent and plant variety rights infringement.
Responding to the patent infringement allegations, Magnani contended that it had been authorized by BASF to use the CLEARFIELD technology with respect to another rice variety known as SIRIUS. Regarding BASF’s allegations that Magnani had infringed BASF’s plant variety rights, Magnani observed that it had previously lawfully obtained a supply of seed of the POLLUX variety for experimental cultivation. It contended that any remaining POLLUX plants in its fields were being grown solely for propagating purposes, and thus its conduct was exempt from liability under Article 14 of Council Regulation (EC) No 2100/94 of 27 July 1994 on Community plant variety rights.
In a decision dated 16 July 2015, the court held that BASF had failed to establish its ownership of a plant variety rights registration for the POLLUX CL variety. According to the court, all that BASF had shown was that the variety was included in the “common Catalogue of varieties of agricultural plant species” established by Council Directive 2002/53/EC of 13 June 2002 on the common catalogue of varieties of agricultural plant species. That directive requires all EU Member States to publish one or more national catalogues of plant varieties accepted for certification and marketing in their territories. Among the criteria for recording a variety in such a common catalogue, the variety must be “distinct, stable, and sufficiently uniform.” The variety must also have a satisfactory value for cultivation and use.
The court acknowledged that the Directive 2002/53 criteria of distinctiveness, stability, and uniformity are similar to the prerequisites for registration of plant variety rights under Regulation 2100/94. However, the court emphasized that the inscription of a variety in the common catalogue–whose primary purpose is the protection of health–is not the equivalent of, or a substitute for, obtaining a registration for plant variety rights–whose object is to award intellectual property rights. In the present case, the court observed that the allegedly unauthorized reproduction by Magnani of the allegedly protected rice variety occurred prior to the appearance of the variety in the common catalogue. For these reasons, the court dismissed BASF’s allegations that Magnani infringed its plant variety rights.
With regard to BASF’s allegations that Magnani infringed its patents, the court determined that additional investigation was necessary before the court could address the allegations.
… the only prerequisite is that the foreign court had a real and substantial connection with the litigants or with the subject matter of the dispute, or that the traditional bases of jurisdiction were satisfied. There is no need to demonstrate a real and substantial connection between the dispute or the defendant and the enforcing forum.

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