Expert Evidence

September 14, 2021
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Federal Circuit Denies Relief to USPTO From Prolific Inventor Gilbert Hyatt

Fed. Cir. Nos. 20-2321-2325: The Federal Circuit clarified that, while an applicant is required to pay all the expenses of PTAB proceedings, this does not include expert witness fees.
December 18, 2018

FCA Reviews Doctrines of Claim Construction and Sufficient Disclosure

2018 FCA 172 – FCA affirms FC’s analysis on sufficient disclosure but quashes claim construction analysis.
July 10, 2018

Federal Court of Appeal Provides Further Guidance on Obviousness

2017 FCA 225 - Federal Court of Appeal upheld the trial level decision invalidating Ciba's Canadian patent for obviousness, and elaborated on the obviousness inquiry, endorsing an approach that focuses on construing the claims rather than identifying the inventive concept.
September 19, 2017

Federal Court finds Expert Blinding to be One Factor in Assessing Weight Given to Expert Evidence

2016 FC 857 - The FC granted Gilead’s application for an order prohibiting the Minister of Health from issuing a Notice of Compliance to Apotex in respect of its Notice of Allegation until the expiry of Gilead’s Canadian patent.
August 8, 2017

IPTV case shows that Interpretation of IT Patents may be 0’s or 1’s

2017 FC 6 - MediaTube brought allegations of infringement against Bell over one of its IT patents, asserting that Bell had infringed the patent with Bell’s IPTV services. The FC deemed the patent to be valid, but not infringed. Costs were decided in Bell’s favour and elevated to reflect the punitive damages claimed by MediaTube and the weak argument they had put forth.
August 1, 2017

Federal Court of Canada finds that complexity of issues or conflicting evidence are not bars to a summary trial

2016 FC 1117 - Cascade brought a claim that Kinshofer had infringed its Canadian patent related to a safety locking device for quick couplers. After carrying out a claim construction, the FC did not find that the patent had been infringed.
June 13, 2017

FC Denies Prohibition Order Request; Finds Expert Blinding Persuasive But Not Primary Interest

2016 FC 382 - The FC concluded that Apotex’s allegations of non-infringement in respect of Shire's Canadian Patent were justified and accordingly denied Shire’s requested prohibition order.
October 3, 2016

FCA Will not Reweigh Expert Evidence to Appeal Patent Invalidity

2015 FCA 191 - The FCA dismissed an appeal wherein Alcon sought to reverse a finding of invalidity against its patent by surreptitiously asking the FCA to reweigh the evidence as a challenge against the Federal Court Judge’s findings of fact and preferred expert evidence.
April 11, 2016

FC Dismisses Prohibition Application – Favours Respondent’s “Blinded Expert” Evidence

2015 FC 570 - The FC favoured the respondent’s "blinded expert" evidence in which the experts provided their opinions before knowing what was claimed in the disputed patents.
March 30, 2016

FCA Nods To SCOTUS, Recommends The Use Of The Clear Error Standard Of Review In Claim Construction Where Expert Evidence Plays A Significant Role

2015 FCA 116 - The FCA advised that where expert evidence plays a significant role, claim construction might involve subsidiary factual disputes reviewed on a palpable and overriding error standard, which is equivalent to the United States clear error standard.
May 13, 2015

Cobalt gets Overlapping Costs Reduced in PM(NOC) Proceeding

Lundbeck Canada Inc v Canada (Health), 2014 FC 1049 - How should overlapping expert costs be allocated? Three parties each sought a Notice of Compliance (NOC) for the same drug, and the innovator relied on much the same expert evidence in each proceeding but costs were not precisely allocated among the three proceedings.
February 3, 2015

ONCA Preserves Protection of Discussions between Expert Witnesses and Lawyers

Moore v Getahun, 2015 ONCA 55 - The Court referred to UK authorities that described patent law as an example of a highly technical area where “expert witnesses require a high level of instruction by the lawyers”, supposedly to liken the highly technical area of patent law to the highly technical area of medical malpractice with respect to its reliance on expert evidence.
October 27, 2014

Expert witnesses proven to be pivotal in Dow Chemical patent infringement suit

Dow Chemical Co v NOVA Chemicals Corp, 2014 FC 844 - The Federal Court found that NOVA Chemicals infringed Canadian Patent No. 2,160,705, owned by The Dow Chemical Company, by NOVA’s use of its “SURPASS” polyethylene product. Allegations of invalidity for lack of utility, claims broader than any invention made or disclosed, anticipation, obviousness, double patenting, and insufficiency of the specification were unsuccessful.
March 10, 2014

FCA Dismisses Pfizer’s Appeal Challenging Admissibility and Weight of Apotex Expert’s Testimony

Pfizer Canada Inc v Apotex Inc, 2014 FCA 54 - The Court rejected Pfizer's argument that the trial judge did not properly apply the R. v. J.-L.J., 2000 SCC 51 case when assessing the admissibility of what Pfizer alleged were novel scientific theories put forth by Apotex’s expert.