“Willful blindness” Enough for Induced Patent Infringement

In 2007, the Federal Circuit raised the bar for willful patent infringement from a negligence type standard to “objective recklessness” in its In re Seagate decision. Recently, U.S. Supreme Court addressed whether liability for induced infringement requires knowledge of the patent-at-issue. In Global-Tech Appliances, Inc. v. SEB S.A., 131 S. Ct. 2060 (U.S. 2011), Defendant Pentalpha obtained a written opinion of non-infringement from an attorney, but allegedly failed to disclose to the attorney that it had in fact copied features from one of plaintiff’s products. The attorney’s patent search did not reveal plaintiff’s product, and Pentalpha proceeded to sell the product to multiple retailers.

The Court ruled that knowledge that the induced acts constitute patent infringement is required for induced infringement under 35 U.S.C. § 271(b). However, the Court also held that the requisite level of knowledge may be satisfied under a “willful-blindness” standard, and that Pentalpha’s conduct satisfied this standard.

Additionally, in June of this year, the Federal Circuit ruled that the “objective recklessness” standard set forth in Seagate is now a question of law and is to be reviewed de novo in Bard Peripheral Vascular, Inc. v. W.L. Gore & Assocs., Inc., 682 F.3d 1003 (June 14, 2012).

Source: http://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/global-tech-appliances-inc-v-seb-s-a/

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