Baxter International, Inc. v. COBE Laboratories, Inc.
United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
88 F.3d 1054 (1996)
- Written by Nicole Gray , JD
Facts
Baxter International, Inc. and Baxter Healthcare Corporation (Baxter) (defendants) owned a patent for a blood-separating sealless centrifuge. More than one year before Baxter’s patent-application date, a third-party scientist experimented with such a centrifuge designed by a fellow scientist to test whether separated blood could be used to produce plasma. The experiments were unknown to the inventor of Baxter’s patent but were conducted in open laboratories at National Institutes of Health and Massachusetts General Hospital, where other scientists witnessed the centrifuge in operation. There was no obligation that the witnesses keep their observations confidential. The designer of the centrifuge used in the plasma experiments gave permission for the separator to be used. However, in his own patent application for the centrifuge, he declared that there had been no public use of it despite the plasma experiments conducted more than one year before either patent application was filed. The district court found that the invention had been reduced to practice and used publicly for purposes that were not experimental. Accordingly, the court granted summary judgment that Baxter’s patent was invalid as barred on the ground of prior public use under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b). Baxter appealed.
Rule of Law
Issue
Holding and Reasoning (Lourie, J.)
What to do next…
Here's why 814,000 law students have relied on our case briefs:
- Written by law professors and practitioners, not other law students. 46,300 briefs, keyed to 988 casebooks. Top-notch customer support.
- The right amount of information, includes the facts, issues, rule of law, holding and reasoning, and any concurrences and dissents.
- Access in your classes, works on your mobile and tablet. Massive library of related video lessons and high quality multiple-choice questions.
- Easy to use, uniform format for every case brief. Written in plain English, not in legalese. Our briefs summarize and simplify; they don’t just repeat the court’s language.