Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University, Petitioner v. Roche Molecular Systems, Inc., et al. (563 U.S. 776)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided June 6, 2011 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 563 U.S. 776 · 131 S. Ct. 2188
- Decided
- June 6, 2011
- Term
- October Term 2010
- Vote
- 7–2
- Majority author
- Justice Roberts
- Issue area
- Economic Activity
- Disposition
- Affirmed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party lost
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
Opinion excerpt
Chief Justice Roberts delivered the opinion of the Court. Since 1790, the patent law has operated on the premise that rights in an invention belong to the inventor. The question here is whether the University and Small Business Patent Procedures Act of 1980 — commonly referred to as the Bayh-Dole Act — displaces that norm and automatically vests title to federally funded inventions in federal contractors. We hold that it does not. I A In 1985, a small California research company called Cetus began to develop methods for quantifying blood-borne levels of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), the virus that causes AIDS. A Nobel Prize winning technique developed at Cetus — polymerase chain reaction, or PCR — was an integral part of these efforts. PCR allows billions of copies of DNA sequences to be made from a small initial blood sample. In 1988, Cetus began to collaborate with scientists at Stanford University’s Department of Infectious Diseases to test the efficacy of new AIDS drugs. Dr. Mark Holodniy joined Stanford as a research fellow in the department around that time. When he did so, he signed a Copyright and Patent Agreement (CPA) stating that he “agree[d] to assign” to Stanford his “right, title and interest in” inventions resulting from his employment at the University. App. to Pet. for Cert. 118a-119a. At Stanford Holodniy undertook to develop an improved method for…
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