Expert Analysis

• Tips For Keeping Trade Secrets In The Vault

  

  Key practices aimed at maintaining confidentiality can help companies establish trade secret status as the Federal Trade Commission's ban on noncompetes makes it prudent to explore other security measures, says John Baranello at Moses & Singer.

• Reducing Patent Litigation Costs Starts With Early Strategy

  

  With the average cost ranging from $1 million to $4 million, defending a patent case can create a serious strain on resources, particularly for midsize or smaller companies, so certain cost-cutting steps should be considered at the outset — even if some seem counterintuitive, say Jeffrey Ahdoot and Wendy Verlander at Verlander.

• Legal Issues To Watch As Deepfake Voices Proliferate

  

  With increasingly sophisticated and accessible voice-cloning technology raising social, ethical and legal questions, particularly in the entertainment industry and politics, further legislative intervention and court proceedings seem very likely, say Shruti Chopra and Paul Joseph at Linklaters.

• Opinion

  'Natural Person' Or Not, AI-Made IP Deserves Protection

  

  The entire legal edifice rests on a determination that an artificial system is not a so-called natural person, and although this may appear to be straightforward on its face, rapid advances in technology may soon force us to revisit our understanding of a natural person, says Manav Das at McDonnell Boehnen.

• Lessons On Challenging Class Plaintiffs' Expert Testimony

  

  In class actions seeking damages, plaintiffs are increasingly using expert opinions to establish predominance, but several recent rulings from California federal courts shed light on how defendants can respond, say Jennifer Romano and Raija Horstman at Crowell & Moring.

• Exploring An Alternative Model Of Litigation Finance

  

  A new model of litigation finance, most aptly described as insurance-backed litigation funding, differs from traditional funding in two key ways, and the process of securing it involves three primary steps, say Bob Koneck, Christopher Le Neve Foster and Richard Butters at Atlantic Global Risk LLC.

• Businesses Should Take Their AI Contracts Off Auto-Renew

  

  When subscribing to artificial intelligence tools — or to any technology in a highly competitive and legally thorny market — companies should push back on automatic renewal contract clauses for reasons including litigation and regulatory risk, and competition, says Chris Wlach at Huge Inc.

• Del. IP Ruling May Mark Limitation-By-Limitation Analysis Shift

  

  A Delaware federal court's recent ruling in Lindis Biotech v. Amgen, which involved complex technology where the complaint contained neither facts nor a specific allegation directed to a claim limitation, might spark a shift away from requiring a limitation-by-limitation analysis, say Ted Mathias and Ian Swan at Axinn.

• Trump Hush Money Case Offers Master Class In Trial Strategy

  

  The New York criminal hush money trial of former President Donald Trump typifies some of the greatest challenges that lawyers face in crafting persuasive presentations, providing lessons on how to handle bad facts, craft a simple story that withstands attack, and cross-examine with that story in mind, says Luke Andrews at Poole Huffman.

• Cell Therapy Cos. Must Beware Limits Of Patent Safe Harbors

  

  Though developers of gene and cell therapy products commonly assume that a legal safe harbor protects them from patent infringement suits, recent case law shows that not all preapproval uses of patented technology are necessarily protected, say Natasha Daughtrey and Joshua Weinger at Goodwin.

• ITC Ruling Has Serious IP Implications For Foreign Imports

  

  While a recent U.S. International Trade Commission decision is a win for trade secret owners who can show injury to a U.S. domestic industry, the decision also means that companies operating in foreign jurisdictions will be subject to the requirements of U.S. trade secret law, say Paul Ainsworth and Cristen Corry at Sterne Kessler.

• What The Justices' Copyright Damages Ruling Didn't Address

  

  While the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent ruling in Warner Chappell v. Nealy clarified when a copyright owner may recover damages in jurisdictions that apply the so-called discovery rule, it did not settle the overriding question of whether the Copyright Act even permits applying the rule, say Ivy Estoesta and William Milliken at Sterne Kessler.

• Series

  Teaching Yoga Makes Me A Better Lawyer

  

  Being a yoga instructor has helped me develop my confidence and authenticity, as well as stress management and people skills — all of which have crossed over into my career as an attorney, says Laura Gongaware at Clyde & Co.

• How Clinical Trials Affect Patentability In US And Europe

  

  A comparison of recent U.S. and European patent decisions — concerning the effect of disclosures in clinical trials on the patentability of products — offers guidance on good practice for companies dealing with public use issues and prior art documents in these commercially important jurisdictions, say lawyers at Finnegan.

• TTAB Ruling Raises Foreign-Language Mark Questions

  

  The Trademark Trial and Appeal Board's recent decision to cancel the Veuve Olivier registration due to its similarity to Veuve Clicquot brings new focus to the treatment of foreign terms and the doctrine of foreign equivalents, say attorneys at Finnegan.