Steven E. Comer

Partner

Tokyo, 81 3 3214 6522

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Education

Saint Marys College of California (B.S., 1986)
;
Vanderbilt University School of Law (J.D., 1991)

Practices

Litigation

Patent Litigation

International Arbitration

Bar Admissions

California
Japan (Gaikokuho-Jimu-Bengoshi)

Steve Comer is an intellectual property litigator. While his most recent cases have been patent disputes for life sciences clients, he has also successfully represented clients involved in trade secret and trademark cases.

Mr. Comer's recent patent cases include the representation of Applied Biosystems (which has now merged with Invitrogen to form Life Technologies), which went to trial in the Northern District of California in 2009. In addition to his handling of the motion phase, he handled witness examinations and cross examinations during the trial. The jury delivered a verdict of noninfringement for the client, protecting AB's ability to sell its DNA sequencing systems and probes.

In another recent case, Mr. Comer was part of the team that represented General Atomics and Carolina Liquid Chemistries in a declaratory judgment action against Axis-Shield ASA. Axis-Shield had accused GAs's enzymatic homocysteine assay of infringement. Mr. Comer argued the claim construction and two summary judgment motions. After winning two summary judgment rulings that GA's assay does not infringe, he also successfully handled the appeal, in which the Federal Circuit upheld all of the rulings in favor of GA.

Watson v. H.J. Heinz Company.

Lead counsel to H.J. Heinz in a trade secret and correction of patent inventorship action. Successfully moved to dismiss the action based upon plaintiff’s lack of standing, and the Federal Circuit unanimously affirmed.

Syntron Bioresearch v. Genix Biotek

(California Court of Appeals, Fourth Appellate District). Secured a $12.5-million judgment and permanent injunction on behalf of our client Syntron Bioresearch in a trade secret and trademark case against former employees accused of stealing monoclonal antibodies, hybridoma cell lines, and production processes used in manufacturing immunoassays.

Abbott Laboratories v. Syntron Bioresearch

(Southern District of California). Successfully reversed a summary judgment of infringement of a biotechnology patent for a client and eventually obtained a jury verdict of non-infringement for Syntron Bioresearch in a patent suit brought by Abbott Laboratories alleging that Syntron's test kits infringed two of Abbott's lateral flow immunoassay patents. Before Morrison & Foerster was retained, the Court had granted summary judgment of infringement in favor of Abbott. We successfully persuaded the Court to reconsider its ruling and to allow Syntron to proceed to trial. After a three-week trial, the jury returned a verdict of non-infringement on both patents asserted by Abbott. On appeal, the Federal Circuit affirmed all issues, except the construction of a single claim term. Following appeal, the case was settled on the terms Syntron had originally proposed. (2007)