Joint Direct Infringement

Palo Alto patent and technology litigation partner James Elacqua spoke at the December 6 “All Hands” meeting of the Silicon Valley Association of General Counsel. He organized and joined a panel discussion titled “What Is All the Fuss About Joint Direct Infringement? (The Saga of Akamai/McKesson),” along with in-house counsel and a patent damages expert. The panelists discussed the issue of joint infringement (or divided infringement), which is becoming more prevalent in patent cases. They focused on the ramifications of a patented method that is allegedly performed by multiple entities, but where no one entity performs all of the steps.