100
Opinion of the Court
infringement must remain concerned about the risk of similar charges if it develops and markets similar products in the future. Given that the burden of demonstrating that changed circumstances provide a basis for vacating the judgment of patent invalidity rests on the party that seeks such action, there is no reason why a successful litigant should have any duty to disclose its future plans to justify retention of the value of the judgment that it has obtained.22
Moreover, our prior cases have identified a strong public interest in the finality of judgments in patent litigation. In Sinclair & Carroll Co. v. Interchemical Corp., 325 U. S. 327 (1945), we approved of the District Court's decision to consider the question of validity even though it had found that a patent had not been infringed. Criticizing the contrary approach taken by other courts, we stated that "of the two questions, validity has the greater public importance, Cover v. Schwartz, 133 F. 2d 541 [(CA2 1943)], and the District Court in this case followed what will usually be the better practice by inquiring fully into the validity of this patent." Id., at 330.
We also emphasized the importance to the public at large of resolving questions of patent validity in Blonder-Tongue Laboratories, Inc. v. University of Ill. Foundation, 402 U. S. 313 (1971). In that case we overruled Triplett v. Lowell, 297 U. S. 638 (1936), which had held that a determination of patent invalidity does not estop the patentee from relitigating the issue in a later case brought against another alleged infringer. We also commented at length on the wasteful
cial Conference of the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit 65 (April 30, 1992)." Id., at 1577, n. 9.
22 Altvater cannot be read to require such a disclosure. In that case, the counterclaimant was a licensee, and there was no question but that its obligations to the patentee would continue unless the patent were found invalid. Our holding did not depend on that fact, however, and we nowhere stated that a counterclaimant could seek the affirmance of a declaratory judgment only if it ensured that its future actions would continue to violate the patentee's alleged rights.
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