Perfect Surgical Techniques vs Olympus America

Perfect Surgical Techniques brought a suit against Olympus America Inc. in November 2012, alleging that Olympus's surgical products infringed on two Perfect Surgical patents--one for a RF generator for a bipolar electrosurgery application and another for bipolar forceps--according to a release from Kaye Scholer LLP, the law firm that represented Olympus America.  

In that court case, three of the four products alleged to be infringing the RF generator for bipolar electrosurgery patent were dismissed. The other patent was judged to be invalid.

In June 2015, Kaye Scholer announced that the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) threw out claims of two of the electrosurgery-related patents as unpatentable because they were "obvious and anticipated." 

At the time, Kaye Scholer partner Deborah Fishman said in the release, "The PTAB ruling for Olympus did exactly what these America Invents Act reviews are supposed to do: short-circuit baseless patent claims that were brought to thwart innovation rather than promote it." 

A year later, in June 2016, the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the PTAB decision. 

Did it pay off for Perfect Surgical Techniques? We say--no.

[Image courtesy of DIGITALART/FREEDIGITALPHOTOS.NET]