Spotlight on Upcoming Oral Arguments - November 2016

Tuesday November 1, 2016

ArcelorMittal v. AK Steel Corporation, No. 16-1357, Court Room 402

In this appeal, the Federal Circuit will answer the question of whether an unconditional covenant not to sue for infringement of a patent-in-suit deprived the district court of subject matter jurisdiction over counterclaims seeking declaratory judgments of noninfringement and invalidity of claims in the same patent. After two earlier appeals and a reissue, two claims survived in ArcelorMittal's originally asserted patent. ArcelorMittal moved to dismiss the case and offered an unconditional covenant not to sue Defendants on the remaining two claims. The District Court nevertheless ruled on Defendants' invalidity counterclaim and found the remaining claims invalid. ArcelorMittal argues that the covenant not to sue eliminated any possible case or controversy between the parties with respect to the two remaining claims of the patent and therefore deprived the district court of