Deviated, Unsound, and Self-Retreating: A Critical Assessment of Princo v. ITC en banc Decision

Abstract

The licensing dispute between Philips and Taiwan CD-R/RW manufacturers has been a powerful generator of new developments in the field of patent and competition, which culminates at the Princo en banc decision in 2010. By adding new elements to the misuse test, this decision confined patent misuse only to patent owner’s restrictions on licensees, substantially constraining its scope and changing the landscape of this doctrine. After careful review of the court’s holding and its reasoning, this article finds it deviating from previous case laws, ignoring the equitable nature and necessary flexibility of the misuse doctrine, and creating disjuncture between patent misuse and antitrust law. A careful reconsideration of this case hence may be necessary.