Supreme Court Sides with Gevo in Long-Standing Patent Dispute

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) In Washington, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Gevo’s favor and overturned an earlier Federal Circuit Court of Appeals ruling on the interpretation of key patent claims.

On April 11, 2013, the Delaware District Court (District Court) entered a final judgment of non-infringement in Gevo’s favor following the acknowledgment by Butamax Advanced Biofuels LLC (Butamax) that Gevo does not infringe Butamax’s asserted patents under the District Court’s construction of a key claim term in Butamax’s Patent Nos. 7,851,188 and 7,993,889.

At the time, Butamax appealed Gevo’s victory, and a US Court of Appeals in February 2014 vacated the District Court’s prior rulings, and ordered the District Court to reconsider issues related to infringement and invalidity.

In turn, Gevo asked the Supreme Court to vacate the Appeals Court’s de novo nterpretation of a disputed claim term. Today, the Supreme Court granted Gevo’s petition and vacated the decision of the Appeals Court.

Meaning that biotech companies, once they have faced their jury or judge on those facts, doesn’t have to worry that a Court of Appeal might conduct a top-to-bottom wholly new review and perhaps, without the benefit of expert witnesses, go another way. READ MORE and MORE (Gevo) and MORE (US Supreme Court) and MORE (Biofuels Digest)