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Patent Cross-Licenses: A Financial Asset Hedge
In today's age of strong patent rights, enhanced visibility and budgetary clout are the norm for intellectual property professionals ' and are generally regarded as good things. With the creation of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (“CAFC”) in 1982, we have seen a number of distinct pro-patent trends. These have included a robust presumption of patent validity, higher damage awards for acts of infringement, more flexible approval standards introduced by the PTO, and an increasingly granted right on the part of patent holders to seek injunctive relief to stop the production of infringing products. Prior to the creation of the unitary CAFC, patent rights were less certain to be enforced through either the award of high monetary damages or sweeping injunctive relief.
“Strong patent rights” as a phrase has a vigorous, unequivocally healthy sound to it. Weak patent rights would not be desirable. A potentially less loaded and more descriptive phrase may be: “patent value inflation.” To say that we live in an era of inflating patent values suggests something of the planning challenges that inflation of any core asset or commodity invariably delivers.
The DOJ's Corporate Enforcement Policy: One Year Later
The DOJ's Criminal Division issued three declinations since the issuance of the revised CEP a year ago. Review of these cases gives insight into DOJ's implementation of the new policy in practice.
Use of Deferred Prosecution Agreements In White Collar Investigations
This article discusses the practical and policy reasons for the use of DPAs and NPAs in white-collar criminal investigations, and considers the NDAA's new reporting provision and its relationship with other efforts to enhance transparency in DOJ decision-making.
How AI Has Affected PR
When we consider how the use of AI affects legal PR and communications, we have to look at it as an industrywide global phenomenon. A recent online conference provided an overview of the latest AI trends in public relations, and specifically, the impact of AI on communications. Here are some of the key points and takeaways from several of the speakers, who provided current best practices, tips, concerns and case studies.
The DOJ's New Parameters for Evaluating Corporate Compliance Programs
The parameters set forth in the DOJ's memorandum have implications not only for the government's evaluation of compliance programs in the context of criminal charging decisions, but also for how defense counsel structure their conference-room advocacy seeking declinations or lesser sanctions in both criminal and civil investigations.