After a recent bench trial in a Hatch-Waxman infringement suit, the court entered a judgment of infringement with respect to two patents and noninfringement and invalidity with respect to two other patents. The court then denied cross-motions to amend judgment, finding that the parties had not met the high burden of showing a “manifest error of law or fact.” Alcon Research Ltd. v. Barr Laboratories Inc., C.A. No. 09-318-LDD (March 16, 2012) at 2.
Looking first at the arguments of Alcon Research, the court rejected the contention that it should not have made findings that neither party’s experts requested. This position, the court explained, was incorrect because a District Court has discretion to make findings of fact relevant to its decision and it “would not act prudently by merely parroting the position of one expert or another, especially when [it has] concerns about those experts.” Id. at 3. The court also refused to amend findings that it found were supported by the facts and rejected arguments that were not advanced at trial, as a motion to amend findings does not allow a party a “second bite at the apple.” Id. at 4-7.
The court then turned to the arguments of ANDA product manufacturer Barr Laboratories. Barr argued that, although Alcon had never actively litigated two patents during the course of the trial, Alcon also had not dismissed those patents from its complaint. The court had denied judgment as a matter of law of noninfringement on these two patents at the close of Alcon’s case because Alcon had never placed them at issue. Barr argued then and on its motion to amend the judgment that because the patents had never been formally dismissed, it needed a judgment of noninfringement in order to launch its generic. Despite the “cursory manner” in which the issue was raised at trial, the court reached the merits of the motion and determined that under Tol-O-Matic Inc. v. Proma Produkt-Und Marketing Gesellschaft m.b.H., 945 F.2d 1546 (Fed. Cir. 1991) and 800 Adept, Inc. v. Murex Sec., Ltd., 539 F.3d 1354 (Fed. Cir. 2008), it had been correct to deny Barr’s motion for judgment of noninfringement. Under these cases, the court found, “a complaint alone cannot support a judgment on claims not actually placed in issue at trial.” Rather, a counterclaim or declaratory judgment claim is necessary to keep “the involved patent claims ‘at issue’ and give[] the patentee fair notice that he must introduce evidence of infringement at trial or risk an adverse judgment.” Id. at 13-19.
Alcon Research Ltd. v. Barr Laboratories Inc., C.A. No. 09-318-LDD (March 16, 2012).
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