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Washington Law Review

Abstract

The Federal Circuit serves as the central appellate court for U.S. patent law appeals. Outside of patent law, scholars have noted the Federal Circuit’s distinct lack of influence on the law. Thus, unnoticed, the Federal Circuit has become one of the most influential actors in the creation of intellectual property licensing law. Its influence reaches across all areas of intellectual property, industries, and all federal circuits and state courts. But the Federal Circuit’s influence on licensing law is more than just a matter of academic interest: licensing is critical to innovation in the information economy. Licenses underlie the creation and distribution of ideas, information, inventions, and works. Products as diverse as open source software and soybean seed rely on licensing. The Federal Circuit’s influence emerged out of failed attempts to create uniform statutory licensing law, which has left licensing law to develop as common law. Since its creation in 1982, the Federal Circuit has decided more cases involving licensing law than any other state or federal court. Many courts have looked to and followed the Federal Circuit’s decisions. The Federal Circuit’s general approach has been to uphold modern licensing models, which fosters both technological and business model innovation. This approach is consistent with the approach taken by most other courts, including the Supreme Court. At the urging of the U.S. Solicitor General and others, the Supreme Court probed the Federal Circuit’s licensing law jurisprudence in a recent case, Quanta Computer, Inc. v. LG Electronics, Inc. While the Supreme Court reversed the Federal Circuit in a unanimous decision, upon close inspection, the reversal actually amounts to an affirmation of the Federal Circuit’s core licensing-law jurisprudence.

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