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Federal Circuit Holds New Task Order Contract Awards Can Be Protested Without Full Procurement

Client Alert | 1 min read | 07.14.16

In Coast Professional, Inc. v. U.S. (July 12, 2016), the Federal Circuit revived bid protests (including that of the lead appellant, represented by Crowell & Moring) challenging task order contract awards that had previously been dismissed for lack of jurisdiction by the CFC. The court held that, because the appellants were challenging the “proposed award or the award” of new task orders under GSA Federal Supply Schedule contracts, which challenges fall squarely within the CFC’s statutory bid protest jurisdiction, it was irrelevant whether the new task orders, which were in the form of award-term extensions, shared some functional similarities to options or originated out of existing contracts rather than being the subject of entirely separate procurements.

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Client Alert | 2 min read | 11.14.25

Defining Claim Terms by Implication: Lexicography Lessons from Aortic Innovations LLC v. Edwards Lifesciences Corporation

Claim construction is a key stage of most patent litigations, where the court must decide the meaning of any disputed terms in the patent claims.  Generally, claim terms are given their plain and ordinary meaning except under two circumstances: (1) when the patentee acts as its own lexicographer and sets out a definition for the term; and (2) when the patentee disavows the full scope of the term either in the specification or during prosecution.  Thorner v. Sony Comput. Ent. Am. LLC, 669 F.3d 1362, 1365 (Fed. Cir. 2012).  The Federal Circuit’s recent decision in Aortic Innovations LLC v. Edwards Lifesciences Corp. highlights that patentees can act as their own lexicographers through consistent, interchangeable usage of terms across the specification, effectively defining terms by implication....