The Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences 2009 went today to a couple of American profs — Elinor Ostrom (at Indiana U. and the first woman to win!) and Oliver Williamson (a Berkeleyite). According to the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, both "Laureates have been instrumental in establishing economic governance as a field of research."
Dr. Williamson's
The Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation met in Richmond on September 24. It has so far issued 19 orders — 14 granting transfer and centralization of multidistrict cases and five not.
Blawgletter couldn't help noting that the Panel has lately added a seventh member – bringing it (at last) back to full strength. U.S. District Judge
Their latest portrait.
The U.S. Supreme Court started its October Term 2009 a day ago — although Their Honors did rehear a big case on September 9.
If you've waited the summer long to see how the Court would deal with your cert. petition, your mandamus application, your request for a writ of prohibition, your
Leland Stanford Junior (1824-93).
The Federal Circuit ruled last week that the Leland Stanford Junior University doesn't own rights in patents (involving methods to check effectiveness of HIV treatments) and therefore can't sue drug-maker Roche for infringement.
The inventor, Mark Holodniy, signed contracts with both the Junior University (in 1988) and Roche's predecessor-in-interest (in the following year). But, while the
Blawgletter visited this building in a hurricane.
Class plaintiffs waited almost a decade — and within six weeks of trial – before asking the district court to delete the main defense firm from the counsel of record list. The district court, we'd all guess, denied the motion. It likely also scolded the lawyers for pushing such a diaphonously
The Antitrust Division said in May that it thought the Supreme Court shouldn't take the case — you know, the one that let the National Football League get away with conspiring to halt competition for fan headgear sales. The Court grabbed it anyway.
Today, the AD said vacate and remand. Will the Justices see things the agency's way
Boy howdy, those judges in the Tenth Circuit sure do know their antitrust! Yeeeeehiiiii!
That court mystified Blawgletter earlier this year in a like case. See "Authentic Ski Resort Gibberish; Tenth Circuit Boots Antitrust Claim".
The new ruling surprises us less, for it draws on verbal hijinks the Supreme Court performed a mere seven
Zoladex® suppresses sex hormones.
AstraZeneca told people it got an average wholesale price of $X for its Zoladex® drug when it in fact received a far lower AWP due to discounts and rebates. The falsely high AWP let Zoladex® fetch more money per dose, enriching doctors who charged the AWP but got discounts and rebates
Your best salesmen quit and joined your toughest rival in the Tulsa "metals" niche. And they, like, totally disrespected their covenants not to compete. Plus they cut just enough off the secret price you quoted a good customer to steal the business!
Except you didn't tell the customer to keep the quote secret. You lose, the Tenth Circuit
Last week, the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice filed a Statement of Interest of the United States of America Regarding Proposed Class Settlement in the Google Books case, The Authors Guild, Inc. v. Google, Inc., No. 05 Civ. 8136 (DC) (S.D.N.Y. Sept. 18, 2009). The press release says:
WASHINGTON —