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FY 2019 NDAA – Cyber Focus

Client Alert | 1 min read | 08.20.18

The 2019 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) includes a robust set of cybersecurity provisions impacting the Defense Industrial Base, including:

  • Encouraging federal agencies to avoid using lowest price technically acceptable source selection criteria in procurements predominately for the acquisition of information technology and cybersecurity services.
  • Establishing a pilot program to oversee Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI) handled by contractors with foreign ownership, control, or influence.
  • Requiring DoD to notify Congress of data breaches involving significant losses of Personally Identifiable Information (PII) or other forms of CUI.
  • Encouraging DoD and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to assist small businesses in the Defense Industrial Supply Chain by enhancing cyber threat awareness and training, and helping to conduct voluntary cybersecurity self-assessments.
  • Requiring DoD to obtain disclosures from vendors regarding foreign government access to products or source codes, before acquiring their cybersecurity or information technology products and services.

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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....

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