chrpai:
You zealots are too funny. The parent company of an equipment manufacturer is suiting competitors over alledged patent violations, and now your telling me the CEO of the manufacturer would just be passively in the background not condoning that action?.
Chippy, what is the basis for your claim that Carleigh Rae is a parent corp. of Halcyon? More rampant speculation based upon a commonality of officers? Or have you actually researched the shareholder structure of Halcyon and Carleigh Rae? If so, I'm certainly impressed since that information is not available online and is not generally available to the public.
There are various ways that something can constitute prior art. People who are interested can look up 35 U.S.C. s. 102 and 35 U.S.C. s. 103 for more information. You'll also want to look at the priority dates of the patents-in-suit and determine whether the claimed matter appeared in the original application or whether it was added later (this is based on my recollection that someone said that the patents-in-suit are children of apps filed back in the mid-80's). You'll need the prosecution history of each app and its parent apps to do that. Those are not available online, but can be ordered from one of several search firms.
Finally, you'll need to examine the inventor's records to determine whether the inventor is able to "swear behind" the earliest application date, and any purported prior art, by demonstrating due diligence in reducing his invention to practice to a time before the prior art. You can get this information through a duly issued subpoena and a deposition notice. It is also possible that you will find information relating to due diligence in reduction to practice in the prosecution history, but only if it arose during prosecution. Its not required as a matter of course.
The duty to disclose prior art and other information that is material to the patentability of an invention is set forth in 37 C.F.R. s. 1.56. But you won't know whether something is prior art until you have conducted the investigation above.
Once this has been done, it will be possible to determine the validity and enforceability of the patent and conduct the two part infringement analysis discussed earlier in the thread.
Finally, after all of this has been completed, it will be possible to intelligently and accurately opine upon the merits of the suit.