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Hot off the press... the US Supreme Court has decided i4i v. Microsoft. At a quick glance: s.282 of the US Patent Act requires a party alleging invalidity to show it by "clear and convincing" evidence. Also at a quick glance, this applies whether or not a piece of prior art was considered by the patent examiner.

I have been focused on the effect CETA would have on patents and pharmaceuticals. Of course, there's lots of other stuff in CETA, including copyright. Michael Geist has posted a copy of his comments to the Standing Committee on International Trade HERE.

Sanofi Pasteur, which makes vaccines, is planning to expand its operations in Toronto.

Norman Siebrasse of UNB law, whom I've written papers with in the past and I think has all sorts of good things to say about patents, now has his own blog:

Go read the post on this topic at Sufficient Description. It brings up an interesting topic - when courts review the validity of patents, does it have to comply with administrative law principles, or is it its own standard? Professor Siebrasse notes that Gauthier J. in Eli Lilly / cefaclor 2009 FC 991 essentially ruled that Supreme Court musing on this point was wrong, and agrees with Gauthier J.

I always think its the beginning of the end of the line for an idea or concept when people start publicly making fun of it. So THIS ARTICLE in Slate Magazine about the Light and Warburton study on drug R&D costs is interesting. The article concludes:

I don’t want to be a blogger that leaves negative comments unaddressed in the comments section, so I want to bring up two good comments to my post on the Light and Warburton article.

First – actually, I shouldn’t have said anything about 11% being a high cost of capital. I certainly don’t keep track of what a reasonable cost is. It could be 20%, for all I know ;)

Here is a link to a recent paper (pdf) by Donald Light and Rebecca Warburton titled "Demythologizing the high costs of pharmaceutical research", (BioSocieties, February 2011) which systematically critiques the estimates of pharmaceutical-related R&D costs routinely promoted by the research-based pharmaceutical companies. As put by Andre Picard in a recent Globe and Mail article, "Drug R&D costs are less than estimated - so why the high prices?",

One risk of blogging is that I often think of something just after pressing "Publish Post" ;)

There have been stories coming out of Ottawa saying the CETA trade deal is in trouble.

First, there is this from Paul Wells:
http://www2.macleans.ca/2011/02/17/free-trade-with-europe-never-mind/#more-173556

An article by Neil Reynolds in the Globe and Mail discussing Canada's relative performance in terms of patent applications filed. The article questions Canada's performance on a per capita basis:

Hot off the presses - Aidan Butler of Gilbert's, "a raffish man of mystery" is named one off Canada's 30 most eligible bachelors!

Joseph Weiler - who, long time ago, was one of my favourite professors at NYU - has stood trial in France for criminal libel "because, as editor-in-chief of the European Jouranl of International Law (EJIL), he refused to remove a book review from an EJIL-affiliated website that the book's author claimed is defamatory."

The Canadian Intellectual Property Office has released a draft of proposed revisions to Chapter 14 of the Manual of Patent Office Practice (or MOPOP), which deals with Unity of Invention. See

Here's an article from the Globe and Mail about a report by Aidan Hollis (U Calgary) and Paul Grootendorst (U Toronto) released today. The lead of the Globe article:

I am happy to relay the news that Nathaniel Lipkus has been named a partner of Gilbert's LLP! I cannot put it any better than Tim Gilbert in this email:

According to this article in the Globe and Mail

"Shoppers Drug Mart Corp. (SC-T38.771.624.36%) is hailing an Ontario court ruling that will allow it to substitute its own discount brand of prescription drugs for those made by big pharmaceutical companies.

Last week, Steve Verheul, Canada's chief negotiator for CETA, held a teleconference to update civil society on the progress of the CETA talks. The sixth negotiating round was held in Brussels, and some good progress was made on market access, regulatory barriers, government procurement, and some progress was made on dispute settlement and geographic indications (!).