Congratulations to our honorees, you make us look good.
Hovey Williams Recognized in The Best Lawyers in America® 2023 Edition
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Intellectual Property Litigation
Four Hovey Williams Partners Honored as Super Lawyers®
We are pleased to announce that four of our Partners, Scott Brown, Cheryl Burbach, Crissa Cook, and Michael Hurd have been selected to the 2022 Missouri & Kansas Super Lawyers list. Selection for the Super Lawyers list means these Partners rate among the top 5% of...
Intellectual Property Rights in Russia – An Update
In response to the economic sanctions imposed by Western countries, the Russian government has legalized intellectual property piracy against rights holders in so called “enemy countries.” The list of countries includes all members of the European Union and the...
USPTO Seeks Trademark Registrations to Combat Scammers
The Department of Commerce recently filed several applications to register the United States Patent and Trademark Office’s (USPTO) trademarks in an ongoing effort to counter scam solicitations of Trademark owners. As anyone who has ever filed a federal Trademark...
Hovey Prevails in Copyright Infringement Case at the 8th Circuit
Hovey Williams LLP successfully defended its client Thomson Sailors Homes and its principals in a copyright infringement action in the Western District of Missouri. In 2019, Judge Steven R. Bough granted summary judgment of no copyright infringement in a case claiming...
Assignor Estoppel: Minerva Surgical v. Hologic
Assignor Estoppel is a patent law doctrine dating back to the 1870 Patent Act and first recognized by the Supreme Court in in the 1924 decision of Westinghouse Elec. & Mfg. Co. v. Formica Insulation. This doctrine prevents an inventor from assigning a patent to...
Review Power of Administrative Patent Judges: United States v. Arthrex
At the end of June, the U.S. Supreme Court decided United States v. Arthrex, which concerned the constitutionality of the decision power of administrative patent judges (APJs). APJs are employees of the United States Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO) that, among...
Subject Matter Eligibility Update
For an applicant to be granted a patent, the patent claims defining the invention must be written so as to satisfy several criteria, including novelty, non-obviousness, clarity, and definiteness. Historically, satisfying these four criteria has been the primary...
IP strategies for strengthening your new idea
Often the biggest problem for building a business around a new idea or invention is not coming up with the initial concept but developing a strategy that enables it to flourish in the marketplace. Once an inventor has the idea, need to consider the landscape in the...
Infringement claims only work when there is a registered copyright
A significant change in intellectual property law took place when the Supreme Court ruled recently on a copyright infringement case. With contradictory rulings on the books in the Circuit Courts, the highest court unanimously determined that copyright infringement...
