PATENT REFORM: Overturn Eolas v. Microsoft

This post is part of our continuing series discussing a US House of Representatives working draft of patent legislation, by Marcus Thymian, Jennifer Swartz, and Dennis Crouch.

In the recent case of Eolas v. Microsoft, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit expanded the scope of Section 271(f) – a section that creates a cause of action for infringement due to foreign sales when a component of a patented invention is supplied from the U.S., knowing that the component will be combined in an infringing manner outside the U.S.  The court ruled that the statute (i) had no tangibility requirement and (ii) was not limited to apparatus claims.

The proposed legislation would make it clear that a component "is a tangible item that is itself combined physically with other components to create the combination that is alleged to infringe."

This change would essentially overrule Eolas v. Microsoft.

3 thoughts on “PATENT REFORM: Overturn Eolas v. Microsoft

  1. 3

    The PTP Patent Reform Library

    This post contains the PTP Patent Reform Library as of June 8, 2005. A .pdf of The Patent Act of 2005 is available for viewing and downloading in the Legislative Materials section Background Information The following resources are considered by ma…

  2. 2

    The PTP Patent Reform Library

    This post contains the PTP Patent Reform Library as of June 8, 2005. A .pdf of The Patent Act of 2005 is available for viewing and downloading in the Legislative Materials section Background Information The following resources are considered by ma…

  3. 1

    The PTP Patent Reform Library

    This post contains the PTP Patent Reform Library as of June 8, 2005. A .pdf of The Patent Act of 2005 is available for viewing and downloading in the Legislative Materials section Background Information The following resources are considered by ma…

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