Wragges wins high profile IP case
Birmingham law firm Wragge & Co's intellectual property (IP) team has secured a winning judgement for US airline carrier Delta Air Lines Inc in a high-profile patent case.
Virgin Atlantic brought the case against Delta for patent infringement relating to the flat-bed seats in its premium cabins.
Although Virgin appeared to have won this case in the Court of Appeal, the European Patent Office subsequently caused the patent to be radically amended, deleting all the claims seat supplier Contour was thought to have infringed.
In this latest action, Mr Justice Arnold gave summary judgment in favour of Delta, finding Virgin had no prospect of establishing infringement of the patent in its amended form. The main implication of the ruling is that Contour's manufacture of the seats is not an act of infringement and Delta is free to continue purchasing the "Solar Eclipse" seats from the manufacturer.
Gordon Harris, head of intellectual property at Wragge & Co, said: "The area of patents and UK unregistered design rights is highly complex and this was a challenging case covering alleged infringement of a patent across multiple territories.”
