Mirowsky fights $6m legal tab in Medtronic spat

Mirowski Family Ventures, on the hook for a $6 million tab for Medtronic‘s (NYSE:MDT) legal costs, told a federal appeals court last week that a lower court misconstrued a 24-year-old deal with Eli Lilly (NYSE:LLY). The long-running case involves patents licensed to Boston Scientific (NYSE:BSX). MFV represents the estate of Dr. Michel Mirowski, who helped invent the implantable defibrillator. The group, which controls several patents related to implantable cardioverter defibrillators and cardiac resynchronization therapy devices, has been pursuing patent infringement cases against Medtronic, Guidant and successor Boston Scientific for years. In January 2014, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously that MFV must prove Medtronic’s devices were in violation, even though Medtronic filed the original patent challenge in 2003, while still under a 1991 sub-license agreement for the technology. The high court in October 2014 declined to hear MFV’s petition that it revisit a lower court decision that Medtronic did not infringe MFV’s patents, which were sub-licensed to Medtronic through Guidant’s then-owner, Lilly. Boston Scientific acquired Guidant in 2006. In late September 2014, a Maryland circuit court ordered that Boston Scientific pay MFV $309 million in back royalties and damages. Judge Susan Robinson of the U.S. District Court for Delaware ruled in June that MFV must cover legal costs in the case, which made it all the way to the U.S. Supreme C...
Source: Mass Device - Category: Medical Equipment Authors: Tags: Cardiovascular Legal News Patent Infringement Boston Scientific Cardiac Rhythm Management Eli Lilly & Co. Guidant Corp. Medtronic Mirowski Family Ventures Source Type: news