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Criminal Law Punishment And Sentencing

Patent Infringement

Patent infringement is the act of utilizing a patented invention without permission from the patent holder. Permission may typically be granted in the form of a license. In many countries a use is required to be commercial (or to have a commercial purpose) to constitute a patent infringement.
The scope of the patented invention or the extent of protection is defined in the claims of the granted patent. In other words, the terms of the claims inform people what they are not allowed to do without the permission of the patent holder.
Patents are territorial and infringement is only possible in a country where a patent is in force. The scope of protection may also vary from country to country, because the patent is examined by patent office in each country/area and may have some difference of patentability, so that a granted patent has not worldwide applicability.
The elements of infringement are typically, any party that manufactures, imports, uses, sells, or offers for sale patented technology, during the term of the patent and within the country that issued the patent, is considered to infringe the patent.
The test varies from country to country, but in general it requires that the infringer's product falls within one or more of the claims of the granted patent. The process employed involves "reading" a claim onto the technology of interest. If all of the claim's elements are found in the technology, the claim is said to "read on" the technology; if a single element from the claim is missing from the technology, the claim does not literally read on the technology and the technology does not infringe the patent with respect to that claim.
In response to allegations of infringement, an accused infringer will generally assert one or more of the following: They are not practicing the patented invention; They are not performing any infringing act in the territory covered by the patent; The patent has expired;...