Promega Corp. v. Life Technologies Corp.

875 F.3d 651
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
DecidedNovember 13, 2017
Docket2013-1011, 2013-1029, 2013-1376
StatusPublished
Cited by18 cases

This text of 875 F.3d 651 (Promega Corp. v. Life Technologies Corp.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Promega Corp. v. Life Technologies Corp., 875 F.3d 651 (Fed. Cir. 2017).

Opinion

CHEN, Circuit Judge.

This case returns to us on remand from the Supreme Court. See Life Techs. Corp. v. Promega Corp., — U.S. -, 137 S.Ct. 734, 741, 197 L.Ed.2d 33 (2017) (Promega II). Defendants-Appellants (collectively, Life) sought review of our decision in Promega Corp. v. Life Technologies Corp., 773 F.3d 1338 (Fed. Cir. 2014) (Promega I), arguing, inter alia, that we erred in holding that a multicomponent product assembled overseas could infringe a United States patent'under 35 U.S.C. §' 271(f)(1) 1 when only a single component of the product is supplied from the United States. The Supreme Court granted-Life’s petition for a writ of certiorari, reversed our judgment, and remanded for further proceed-, ings consistent with its holding that “§ 271(f)(1) does not cover the supply of a single component of a multicomponent invention.” Promega II, 137 S.Ct. at 743.

The Supreme Court’s opinion did hot affect several of our prior holdings. First, we held; that the asserted claims of four patents owned by Promega Corporation (Promega) were invalid for failure to comply with the enablement requirement in 35 U.S.C. § 112, ¶ 1. Promega I, 773 F.3d at 1346-50. Second, we held that certain -of Life’s alleged acts- of infringement were not licensed under a 2006 license agreement between Life and Promega. 2 Id. at 1357-58. Finally, we held that Life was not required to “actively induce” a third party to combine the components of the accused products to be liable under § 271(f)(1). Id. at 1351-53. Rather, the active inducement requirement could be met if Life had the specific intent to combine the components itself. Id. We reaffirm our holdings on the enablement, licensing, and active inducement issues.

The Supreme Court’s opinion, however, requires us to reconsider two of our prior holdings. First, we must reexamine our reversal of the district court’s grant of Life’s motion for judgment as a matter of law (JMOL) that Promega failed to prove its infringement case under 35 U.S.C. § 271(a) 3 and § 271(f)(1), 4 See id. at 1358.. Second, we must reconsider our vacatur of the district court’s denial of Promega’s motion for a new trial on damages and infringement. Id. For the reasons below, we now affirm the district court’s decisions on these motions.

Background

In our prior opinion, we described the asserted patents, accused products, and procedural history before the district court. See id. at 1341-45. We recite below only the facts relevant to our analyses of the district court’s rulings on Life’s JMOL motion and Promega’s motion for. a new trial.

I. Factual Background

From 2006 through 2012, Lifé sold genetic testing kits designed to detect the presence of “short tandem repeats” (STR), which are repeating sequences of DNA that are analyzed when profiling an individual’s DNA. Id. at 1341-42, 1344. Life’s kits, referred to as “STR kits,”'were assembled in the United Kingdom. Id. at 1350. Each of the kits was comprised of five components. At least one of the five components in each kit—Taq polymerase—was supplied from the United States. Id. at 1344.

Promega was the exclusive licensee of United States Reissue Patent No. 37,984 (Tautz patent), which expired in 2015. The Tautz patent claimed methods and kits for analyzing DNA to determiné the identity and kinship of organisms. See, e.g., Tautz patent, J.A. 406, col. 11 1. 51-col. 12 1. 64; J.A. 407, col. 13 11. 28-47.

II. Proceedings in District Court

A. Pretrial Proceedings •

Promega sued Life for infringement of the Tautz patent by Life’s STR kits, seeking damages for infringement' occurring between 2006 and 2012.

At summary judgment, Promega moved for a ruling that Life’s accused products meet all of the elements of the asserted claims of the Tautz patent. See generally J.A. 688-703. Life did not challenge this assertion. Therefore, the district court granted Promega’s motion. Promega did not request a ruling on Life’s liability under any particular subsection of § 271 or any ruling quantifying Life’s infringing acts. Therefore, the district court’s summary judgment ruling did not resolve the ultimate issue of Life’s liability for infringement—that is, the' district court did not decide how many of Life’s kits, all assembled abroad, were sold, offered.for sale, or imported into the United States (§ 271(a)) or included a substantial portion of their respective components that were supplied from the United States (§ 271(f)(1)). 5 The district court explained, in a later opinion resolving the parties’ various motions in limine, that, at summary judgment, it “did not enter judgment in favor of plaintiff on liability generally.” J.A.36.

B. Trial

The case proceeded to a jury trial. On the first day of trial, the parties, stipulated that Life’s total worldwide sales, of the accused products during the pertinent time period amounted to $707,618,247. J.A. 189. Later, during Life’s case-in-chief, a dispute arose as to the effect of the parties’ stipulation. During Life’s direct examination of Mr. Guido Sandulli, one of Life’s employees, counsel for Life asked Mr. Sandulli to quantify the amount of United States sales of Life’s accused products since 2006. J.A. 6126. Promega objected to the question on the basis that the amount of United States sales was irrelevant to any issue in dispute at trial. The district court overruled the objection. Promega then requested a sidebar at which it argued that “[t]he whole purpose of [the.stipulation] was to remove from this case the need for the plaintiff to go into [a] series of witnesses to prove up sales of infringing kits.” J.A. 6127. Life countered that there was still a live issue as to whether Promega was entitled to “damages on worldwide sales or simply on U.S. sales.” J.A. 6130. Promega responded that prior statements by Life had created the impression that Promega was not required to prove anything at trial regarding the amount of domestic versus foreign sales, in view of the stipulation.

The district court expressed its own confusion regarding whether the parties had agreed that Promega did riot need to separately quantify domestic and foreign sales. This confusion arose from prior statements by Life indicating that the only disputed issues for trial related to licensing, damages, and willfulness. For example, when Promega attempted to introduce sales evidence during its case-in-chief, Life objected, stating that the evidence was irrelevant to any issue at trial and that “[t]he reason for [the] stipulation was so the plaintiffs would not need to use underlying sales data to prove some overall sales number.” J.A. 5571-73.

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