Interference No. 103,878
"inventorship" issue to be decided is thus merely who
conceived the invention for which patent protection is sought,
and not who first conceived that invention. Sewell, 21 F.3d
at 415, 30 USPQ2d at 1358.
As the junior party in an interference between
co-pending applications, junior party Thompson et al. bears
the burden of proving priority or, in this case inventorship,
by a preponderance of the evidence. See Cooper v. Goldfarb,
154 F.3d 1321, 1326, 47 USPQ2d 1896, 1900 (Fed. Cir.
1998)(quoting Scott v. Finney, 34 F.3d 1058, 1061, 32 USPQ2d
1115, 1117 (Fed. Cir. 1994)).
Conception has been defined as the formation, in the
mind of the inventor, of a definite and permanent idea of the
complete and operative invention. Coleman v. Dines, 754 F.2d
353, 359, 224 USPQ 857, 862 (Fed. Cir. 1985)(quoting Gunter v.
Stream, 573 F.2d 77, 80, 197 USPQ 482, 484 (CCPA 1978)). It
is settled that in establishing conception a party must show
every feature recited in the count, and that every limitation
in the count must have been known at the time of the alleged
conception. Coleman, 754 F.2d at 359, 224 USPQ at 862.
13
Page: Previous 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007