Pharma Patent Nuclear War In Action
from the boom-goes-the-dynamite dept
Peter Amstutz writes "Techdirt often talks about the "mutually assured destruction" model of patent litigation. Well, here is an excellent example of the staggering costs of competing through the courts instead of the markets. Boston Scientific and Johnson & Johnson have been locked in patent disputes for years, each alleging the other infringed on the their patents. Recently, Boston Scientific was ordered to pay a staggering $1.73 Billion (with a B!) in settlement to J&J. As if that's not enough, apparently there are additional unrelated patent cases still ongoing between the companies. One wonders how much has been spent on lawyers."Think of all this money being shuffled around having nothing to do with actually creating new products that help people or actually getting those products to market where they can help. The patent system isn't being used to promote progress here at all, but to stifle competition and hold back progress.
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Filed Under: patents, pharma
Companies: boston scientific, johnson & johnson
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What about all those awsome new products from J&J
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Re: What about all those awsome new products from J&J
I mentioned this to a fairly high level person at J&J and he excitedly said that was one of their products. We then had an interesting discussion about market segments which are not anticipated. I am sure that this is a growing market segment today and I hear that the Coalition for Patent Fairness and Piracy have banded together to fund a Chinese plant to pirate personal lube formulas for their own use. They must be shipping it into the US in container loads the way things are going.
In any event, J&J does produce many innovative products and even more important they learned that dealing reputably with inventors is good business.
Ronald J. Riley,
I am speaking only on my own behalf.
Affiliations:
President - www.PIAUSA.org - RJR at PIAUSA.org
Executive Director - www.InventorEd.org - RJR at InvEd.org
Senior Fellow - www.PatentPolicy.org
President - Alliance for American Innovation
Caretaker of Intellectual Property Creators on behalf of deceased founder Paul Heckel
Washington, DC
Direct (810) 597-0194 / (202) 318-1595 - 9 am to 8 pm EST.
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What does this kind of litigation do ...
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Re: What does this kind of litigation do ...
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Paywall
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Just shows the pro-patent trolls are right when they say it costs a fortune to bring products to market...
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Re:
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Re: Re: the broken patent system.
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The price did not go up.
Now think about the economic drain on America's economy when the patent pirating entity is outside the US. That means lost jobs and prosperity. One example of this is the Rambus saga.
Ronald J. Riley,
I am speaking only on my own behalf.
Affiliations:
President - www.PIAUSA.org - RJR at PIAUSA.org
Executive Director - www.InventorEd.org - RJR at InvEd.org
Senior Fellow - www.PatentPolicy.org
President - Alliance for American Innovation
Caretaker of Intellectual Property Creators on behalf of deceased founder Paul Heckel
Washington, DC
Direct (810) 597-0194 / (202) 318-1595 - 9 am to 8 pm EST.
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The system is broken because when internet tech came out, the landgrab lost its mind and for the next 15-20 years everyone will be living in fear of getting sued out of business over using custom XML (hint:all XML is custom)
The entire system is broken, at this point the only fix would be limiting them to 3 years and after that a public system of licencing.
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Re: 3 years?
I feel there is no justification for a term of even 3 days for the vast majority of things that have been granted patents recently, at least in the software realm, which you are discussing, and in most other realms as well. If there is to be a fix rather than outright abolition of patents, it might be a strict limitation on the granting of patents such that patents are granted only to things which are not natural developments in the field. I don't have any suggestion about how to set up a system to properly evaluate applications to insure that nondeserving applications are rejected. Perhaps it could be done. But outright abolition would certainly be easier and VERY effective. There might be other approaches.
I'm not very concerned that abolishing patents would slow down innovation. People don't invent things to secure patents. They invent things to solve some problem they have. In the absence of patents, those people will still have problems to solve, so they will still invent things. And it generally will be easier than it is now, since they won't be distracted either by making an effort to patent the invention or by dealing with claims they are infringing someone's patent.
The only thing I have some concern about is whether there are some inventions that won't happen because the time and/or cost would be too much to undertake without the possibility of getting the monopoly that a patent grants. The pharma industry is often cited as an area where patents are necessary for this reason, but Mike has said many times that there are lots of reasons to believe that people who claim that are wrong. He keeps promising to write about that sometime, but never seems to get around to it.
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Jarndyce and Jarndyce
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You might think that the lack of progress is because Boston Scientific chose duplication over innovation.
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Re:
That is the point, it can not be done.
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Finding solutions to global health issues is more important than trying to live in little TAMmy's fantasy land.
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Re: (innovation)
J&J (and unfortunately anyone else who can afford to do it) can simply patent broad swathes of all possible inventions without having to do any messy work.
"Yes, this patent covers any stent-like devices. not any particular design, just all of them, so pay us forever. Designs? no, we dont have any schematics of an Actual product, that part isnt really important, is it?"
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Medical Devices != Pharma
J&J is a Pharma company but the patents involved are for medical products. They happen to contain a drug but if that makes Boston Scientific a part of Big Pharma then you have to include every soap maker in that category.
The war of patents is part of doing business on the cutting edge. If you are going to spend any money in R&D you have to have patents to at least make that spending worth the risk.
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Re: Medical Devices != Pharma
- Actually, it is part of the human condition better known as insanity.
"If you are going to spend any money in R&D you have to have patents to at least make that spending worth the risk."
- See - that's just crazy talk
And seriously, you have to admit, it is not the most efficient way of doing things
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That is why the U.S. doesn't compete anymore.
IP laws and a very litigious nature is turning the business environment into a sterile one for conducting any kind of business.
J&J on the original article was said to have problems because and increase in competition and the lack of new products but it is doing very well litigating.
There is something wrong when it is cheaper to put medicine and medical hardware into a ship and cross oceans than it is to do it locally.
The world should look at the U.S. and see what they don't want to do to themselves.
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Re: That is why the U.S. doesn't compete anymore.
The US leading the way to what not to do.
Hey! We are still at least in the lead somewhere.
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whiners
Big companies like to whine about that because the fact is they are continually out maneuvered by smaller more nimble firms. Patents for big firms are a nightmare and the only hope for small firms.
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Just Nuke
If their patent fight has been misguided it is the CEOs and Boards who should be held to account by the shareholders.
In a capitalist society it is difficult to imagine why anyone and in particular the "Dirty Tech Guy" Mike should believe that the patent system should be held to account for litigation or "progress". The latter being of course completely in the eye of the beholder.
Mike's grandfather Josef Stalin thought progress was the death of 5,000,000 peasant farmers who did not like his form of progress. Perhaps Mike will enlighten us with his definition of progress?
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Difference
I would love to see how Mike would react to someone coming in and swiping his assets. I bet he would be just as militant as inventors have been forced to become.
Ronald J. Riley,
I am speaking only on my own behalf.
Affiliations:
President - www.PIAUSA.org - RJR at PIAUSA.org
Executive Director - www.InventorEd.org - RJR at InvEd.org
Senior Fellow - www.PatentPolicy.org
President - Alliance for American Innovation
Caretaker of Intellectual Property Creators on behalf of deceased founder Paul Heckel
Washington, DC
Direct (810) 597-0194 / (202) 318-1595 - 9 am to 8 pm EST.
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Re: Difference
Again, not sure how many times this needs to be repeated, but everything on this site is public domain. You are free to take it. That's because we based our business model on not relying on locking up things that can be copied.
So why do you keep stating falsehoods?
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