The judge determined that Mr. Higgins had infringed upon Maureen
Garners patent as their process had been nearly identical although it
had not been identical. Aside from this fact, judge further states that
the patent itself does not meet the requirement of being novel or
non-obvious and therefore it is invalid and Mr. Higgins does not need
to change any of his business practices. I agree with the judges
decision, as one of her reasons was that it is nonobvious. Gathering
demographic information and purchase history is not a skill that an
ordinary person could not have discovered in a similar store within
the industry. This also ties into the issue of it not meeting the criteria
to be novel. The gathering of consumer information and purchase
history occurs in many industries and businesses and therefore is not
considered to be a new idea. Although Garner states that the
difference is that she patented this process for online versus in the
store which she considers basic customer service which is what
Higgins had been doing for 7 years, other stores that were not
necessarily shoe stores had similar but not identical process. This is
why I agree with the judge. Her process was not considered new and
this process was able to be complete by and ordinary person with no
specific skill as it occurred in stores and through other retailers
already.
Reference:
Kubasek, N. K., Browne, M. N., Dhooge, L. J., Herron, D. J., &
Barkacs, L., (2020). Theories of Liability for Defective Products.
McGraw-Hill Connect.
