Submarine Patent - Famous Submarine Patent Owners

Famous Submarine Patent Owners

Jerome H. Lemelson filed many applications that became submarine patents. He and his heirs have collected over 1.3 billion dollars (U.S.) in royalties. However, in 2004 Lemelson's estate was defeated in a notable court case involving Symbol Technologies and Cognex Corporation, which sought (and received) a ruling that 76 claims under Lemelson's machine vision patents were unenforceable. The plaintiff companies, with the support of dozens of industry supporters, spent millions on this landmark case. The ruling was upheld on September 9, 2005 by a three judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit under the doctrine of laches, citing "unreasonably long … delays in prosecution." Lemelson's estate appealed for a review by the full circuit en banc. On November 16, 2005, the full court declined to review the case, but, citing "prejudice to the public as a whole," extended the original unenforceability ruling to all claims under the patents in question.

The patents at issue are: U.S. Patent 4,338,626, U.S. Patent 4,511,918, U.S. Patent 4,969,038, U.S. Patent 4,979,029, U.S. Patent 4,984,073, U.S. Patent 5,023,714, U.S. Patent 5,067,012, U.S. Patent 5,119,190, U.S. Patent 5,119,205, U.S. Patent 5,128,753, U.S. Patent 5,144,421, U.S. Patent 5,249,045, U.S. Patent 5,283,641, U.S. Patent 5,351,078.