President Judge Jan Jurden announced the appointment of Judge Paul R. Wallace to the Complex Commercial Litigation Division of the Delaware Superior Court.

In Akamai Technologies v. Limelight Networks, 793 F.3d 1020 (2015), a unanimous U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit clarified the standard for joint infringement by finding the defendant liable because it directed or controlled the actions of a third party that performed one or more steps of a claimed method. The Federal Circuit found…

In St. Clair Intellectual Property Consultants, Inc. v. Toshiba Corp., C.A. No. 09-354-KAJ (Nov. 23, 2015), Judge Jordan denied a motion for attorneys’ fees filed by the defendants, Toshiba Corporation, Toshiba America Information Systems, Inc., and Toshiba America, Inc. (“Toshiba”), against the plaintiff, St. Clair Intellectual Property Consultants, Inc. (“St. Clair”). Toshiba first argued that St.…

In 2015, Delaware passed one of the world’s most innovative arbitration regimes: the Delaware Rapid Arbitration Act (the DRAA). Richards Layton attorneys closely involved with the development of the DRAA published a guide immediately after the law was enacted, and now at the start of 2016 they have issued a second edition of this popular handbook. The Practitioner’s Guide to the Delaware Rapid Arbitration Act, Second Edition provides an in-depth discussion of the nuances and the practical application of the DRAA.

The Delaware Supreme Court recently held thatan uncoerced, fully informed vote of a majority ofthe disinterested stockholders adopting a mergeragreement invoked the business judgment rule standardof review, even though the vote was statutorilyrequired. The opinion left unanswered the questionas to whether the business judgment rule invokedin that context was a rebuttable presumption ora substantive rule of…

In Orexo AB v. Actavis Elizabeth LLC, C.A. No. 14-829-SLR/SRF (D. Del. Nov. 20, 2015), Judge Robinson overruled the plaintiffs’ objections to Magistrate Judge Fallon’s ruling regarding a discovery dispute. The plaintiffs had requested samples of the raw materials used to make the defendant’s product and intermediate samples of the product during formulation. Magistrate Judge Fallon…

In Enzo Life Sciences, Inc. v. Life Technologies Corp., C.A. No. 12-105-LPS (D. Del. Nov. 5, 2015), Chief Judge Stark granted the defendants’ request to increase the number of prior art references from six to twelve per asserted claim as to one of the patents-in-suit. According to the Court, the plaintiff’s lack of clarity over the…

In Two-way Media Ltd. v. Comcast Cable Communications, LLC, C.A. No. 14-1006 (D. Del. Nov. 17, 2015), Judge Andrews ruled on disputed terms in the parties’ proposed protective order, prohibiting the plaintiff from sharing highly confidential information received from one defendant with defendants in the related cases, but refusing to extend the prosecution bar to cover…

In Endo Pharmaceuticals Inc. v. Actavis Inc., C.A. No. 14-1381-RGA (D. Del. Nov. 17, 2015), Judge Andrews overruled objections to a report and recommendation concluding that the patent-in-suit should be found invalid due to lack of patent-eligible subject matter. The patent was directed to a method for treating renally impaired patients with a dosage of oxymorphone.…

In April 2015, Delaware Governor Jack Markell signed into law one of the most highly specialized arbitration statutes ever passed: the Delaware Rapid Arbitration Act (hereafter the “Act” or the “DRAA”). The Act, a response to the request by Delaware’s corporate citizenry for a modern and useful arbitration statute, is the work of an interdisciplinary team…