WASHINGTON, D.C., May 13, 2013 – In a unanimous ruling delivered today, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed its support for protecting U.S. innovations that are a critical part of supporting the world’s growing needs. The case, Bowman v. Monsanto, centered on the protection of intellectual property and its outcome was crucial for innovations that deliver benefits to millions of Americans.

The Supreme Court’s decision affirms the basic purpose of the U.S. patent system – providing an incentive to innovate by providing inventors a meaningful opportunity to recover costs on their R&D investments. The decision also reflects the Court’s sensitivity to the importance of patent protection not only for agriculture companies such as Monsanto, but for the basic incentive structure the patent system provides for innovation.

“The Court’s ruling today ensures that longstanding principles of patent law apply to breakthrough 21st century technologies that are central to meeting the growing demands of our planet and its people,” said David F. Snively, Executive Vice President, Secretary, and General Counsel of Monsanto. “The ruling also provides assurance to all inventors throughout the public and private sectors that they can and should continue to invest in innovation that feeds people, improves lives, creates jobs, and allows America to keep its competitive edge.”

The Court’s ruling comes at a time when the role of technology and innovation in meeting the demands of our world has never been more important. As part of the proceedings leading up to this case, a wide range of independent organizations and individuals expressed support for the protection and preservation of intellectual property rights. This group included: the American Soybean Association, the American Seed Trade Association, the Biotechnology Industry Organization, a coalition of leading universities (including the University of California, Duke University, Emory University, the University of Illinois, Iowa State, the University of Kansas, Kansas State, the University of Missouri-Columbia, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and other university organizations such as the Association of American Universities, the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, and the Association of Public and Land Grant Universities), the Intellectual Property Owners Association, the Washington Legal Foundation, and the Business Software Alliance (whose members include Apple and Microsoft).

Innovation continues to play a critical role in supporting the agriculture industry and the customers it serves around the world. Today, farmers throughout the United States and world have a wide range of seed products available to purchase from hundreds of seed companies each and every season – these choices include conventional, organic and biotechnology-improved crop products. Biotechnology-improved crops, one of which was at issue in this case, have been widely popular among both small-holder and large-scale farmers as the products enable them to create a sustainable future for their own farming operation by producing more food with fewer resources. Modern-day applications in agriculture, including both plant breeding and plant biotechnology, are expected to continue to make crops more resistant to disease, drought and pests, and more nutritious for consumers. 

Interested parties can access more information about the case, its history, and the briefs of the parties and the dozens of friends-of-the-court who filed briefs in the Supreme Court at: www.innovationatstake.com.

About Monsanto Company
Monsanto Company is a leading global provider of technology-based solutions and agricultural products that improve farm productivity and food quality. Monsanto remains focused on enabling both small-holder and large-scale farmers to produce more from their land while conserving more of our world’s natural resources such as water and energy. To learn more about our business and our commitments, please visit: www.monsanto.com.  Follow our business on Twitter® at www.twitter.com/MonsantoCo, on the company blog, Beyond the Rows at www.monsantoblog.com, or subscribe to our News Release RSS Feed.

The company requires growers to use the seeds only for a single crop, and they can’t save the “second generation” seeds from the harvest. Monsanto imposes the conditions because its technology, which renders crops resistant to weed killer, reproduces itself in each generation of seeds.

If farmers could replant seeds taken from each harvest, they could avoid paying for Monsanto’s biotechnology in future plantings, the company argued to the high court.

During oral arguments Tuesday, the justices considered the unusual planting tactics of Indiana famer Vernon Bowman, who appealed to the high court after Monsanto successfully sued him for infringing its Roundup Ready patents.

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WASHINGTON, D.C., Feb. 19, 2013 – The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments today in Bowman v. Monsanto, a case that highlights the crucial role that patent protection plays in fostering and protecting U.S. innovation across a broad range of industries—including agriculture, medicine, computer software, and environmental science—that deliver benefits to millions of Americans.

Monsanto’s arguments to the Court underscored the role that patent rights play in enabling innovation in biotechnology and other fields where breakthrough discoveries require substantial R&D investments that depend upon the protections afforded under U.S. patent law.

“Today’s case highlights the importance of intellectual property protection in supporting America’s continued investments in breakthrough 21^st century technologies that support the increasing demands of our planet and our people,” said David Snively, Executive Vice President and General Counsel for Monsanto. “We are confident the Court will give thoughtful consideration to the arguments expressed today.  America’s leadership in fostering the incentive to invest in research and development has created the world’s leading innovation economy, with millions of high-technology jobs—not just in our field of agriculture, but in other R&D-intensive fields like medicine, biotechnology, computer science and environmental science.”

A number of independent organizations and individuals filed amicus curiae (“friend of the court”) briefs urging the Supreme Court to uphold the lower courts’ rulings in favor of Monsanto.   This broad group included leading universities and research institutions; national farm groups representing virtually all of the nation’s corn, soybean, sugar and wheat growers; biotechnology companies; professors of economics and intellectual property; and representatives of the computer software industry.  The briefs from the farm organizations highlighted the importance of patent protection in supporting agricultural innovation, which continues to bring about higher-yielding crops that are better equipped to withstand increased environmental stresses.

Organizations that supported a ruling that protects and preserves intellectual property included: the American Soybean Association, the American Seed Trade Association, the Biotechnology Industry Organization, a coalition of leading universities (including the University of California, Duke University, Emory University, the University of Illinois, Iowa State, the University of Kansas, Kansas State, the University of Missouri-Columbia, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and other university organizations such as the Association of American Universities, the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, and the Association of Public and Land Grant Universities), the Intellectual Property Owners Association, the Washington Legal Foundation, and the Business Software Alliance (whose members include Apple and Microsoft).

The case concerns the unauthorized reproduction of Monsanto’s genetically improved soybeans, which contain patented biotechnology that allows weed control by protecting crops during use of the world’s leading herbicide, glyphosate.  The soybeans are extraordinarily popular with growers nationwide, because Monsanto’s technology enables growers to apply herbicide after their crops and weeds have emerged, controlling the weeds without harming the soybean plants.  When first introduced in 1996, this novel approach marked a significant improvement from prior herbicide and tillage systems and has been shown to reduce soil erosion by enabling and encouraging conservation tillage.  The petitioner in this case (Bowman) challenged the enforceability of Monsanto’s patent rights after taking the unconventional step of buying soybeans containing the patented technology from a local grain elevator and, from 1999 to 2007, repeatedly planting, cultivating, and harvesting them to create his own supply of soybeans containing the technology.  The patents in the technology expire in 2014.

In the agriculture sector alone, Monsanto and its competitors are investing billions of dollars annually on R&D in agricultural advancements, and pursuing novel approaches through plant breeding and plant biotechnology to make crops higher yielding and more resistant to various environmental stresses.

Interested parties can access more information about the case, its history, Monsanto’s brief, and the U.S. government’s brief online at: www.innovationatstake.com.

About Monsanto Company

Monsanto Company is a leading global provider of technology-based solutions and agricultural products that improve farm productivity and food quality. Monsanto remains focused on enabling both small-holder and large-scale farmers to produce more from their land while conserving more of our world’s natural resources such as water and energy. To learn more about our business and our commitments, please visit: www.monsanto.com.  Follow our business on Twitter^® at www.twitter.com/MonsantoCo, on the company blog, Beyond the Rows at www.monsantoblog.com, or subscribe to our News Release RSS Feed.

SANDBORN, Ind.—A dispute between an Indiana farmer and Monsanto Co. over soybean seeds has sprouted into a U.S. Supreme Court case that could have broad implications for industries from software to nanotechnology.

At issue is how long Monsanto can claim patent protection for its genetically engineered seeds. The crop-biotechnology company is squaring off against 75-year-old Vernon “Hugh” Bowman, whom it sued in 2007 after he planted soybeans that came from crops grown by other farmers using Monsanto seeds.

Monsanto contends its patent protection extends beyond its first-generation seeds, while Mr. Bowman argues the company’s patent rights were exhausted by the time he bought later-generation seeds from a local grain elevator. The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments from each side Tuesday.

How the high court rules could influence patent rights for other companies developing technologies that either replicate themselves or can be copied by their users. Various trade groups have filed briefs supporting Monsanto, including organizations representing software firms such as Microsoft Corp. and Apple Inc. The groups say a ruling against the seed maker would “eviscerate” tech companies’ patent protection.

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When President Obama made his case for continued innovation in this week’s State of the Union address, he should have cast a special glance at the nine robed attendees in the front row. In a matter of days the U.S. Supreme Court will hear a case whose impact on innovation will be felt for decades to come.

Bowman v. Monsanto is about patents, but particularly about cutting-edge technologies and products that are by nature easy to copy. Our patent law principles were intended to foster innovation by giving innovators the temporary right to prevent others from copying their inventions. The law clearly prohibits someone from buying a patented item, copying it, and selling it, without permission. With the rise of biotechnology and other advances, many patented technologies are based on biological or other materials that are by nature replicable, making illicit copying as tempting as it is easy. Do inventors retain the rights to temporary exclusivity for those easy-to-make copies as well? The explicit motivation that is the foundation of our patent system would seem to make the answer clear, but that’s the question facing the court.

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Amici in Bowman v. Monsanto Emphasize Vital Role of Patent Protection

Download: Press Release

WASHINGTON, DC, Jan. 24 – In amicus briefs filed with the U.S. Supreme Court, representatives from a wide array of industries argued that Bowman v. Monsanto, which the Court will hear in February, could jeopardize some of the most innovative research taking place today – not only in agriculture, but in industries from medicine to environmental science that rely on patent systems to make R&D investments economically viable.

In its brief, the (ASTA) said that, “[Under Bowman's proposed rule,] [i]nvestment American Seed Trade Association in patented seed technology, which is currently on the order of billions of dollars a year, would be expected to slow to a trickle; private firms would have little incentive to invest the substantial resources required to develop improved seed technology if their patent rights were basically forever extinguished upon the very first sale. And for those few stalwart developers remaining in the business, those companies would have to recoup their research and development and regulatory costs—and earn a return on investment—all through a limited number of transactions with first-time customers. The price of seed in such circumstances would likely be so prohibitively expensive that few farmers could afford it, and farmers (and the public) would be deprived of the current and future benefits of enhanced seed.”

In his brief, Professor , University of Missouri – Kansas City, said, “The potential impact of Christopher M. Holmanthis case goes well beyond Monsanto and soybeans. A decision that results in the exhaustion of patent rights in copies of self-replicating products could dramatically undermine investment in a host of promising green technologies for sustainably feeding, fueling and healing the world. It might also discourage commercialization of synthetic biology, the much heralded next iteration of the biotechnology revolution.”

In their brief, an esteemed group of academic and professional economists stated that, “[A] ruling that the first sale of a patent trait or seed exhausted all patent right would cause significant economic harm—higher prices, lower output, and decreased competition. Seed and trait innovators would have to charge a price for the first sale that captured the full value of the invention. Such high upfront costs would be problematic for farmers with highly variable income, requiring long-term borrowing at higher interest rates. Moreover, that upfront investment would lock farmers into a particular seed choice for years, stifling the competition—and the resulting stimulus to innovation—that occurs as farmers seek out the best new seed varieties from season to season.” (The writers of this brief specialize in agriculture economics, industrial organization, intellectual property, the economics of innovation. They are of the University of Virginia, of Iowa State Dr. Kenneth G. Elzinga Dr. Dermot J. Hayes University and , a vice president of Cornerstone Research, and , a vice Dr. Vandy HowellDr. Anne Layne-Farrarpresident of Charles River Associates).

The (BIO) argued in its brief that, “[P]reserving the patentee’s right to make Biotechnology Industry Organization the lifesaving vaccines, medical treatments, diagnostics, and other cutting-edge scientific products that are predicated on replicable forms of technology allows biotech innovations to be disclosed to the public without eviscerating the patent’s protections at the moment of the first sale. With the right to make their patented product or process protected, patent holders can undertake prolonged, stage-by-stage development in partnership with other researchers and developers confident that cooperative use of their inventions will not imperil their patent rights.”

The writes, “If the doctrine of patent exhaustion were improperly Intellectual Property Owners Association extended to the routine growth of recombinant host cells, this could have a devastating effect on investment in the production of new biologic drugs made from recombinant cells. If patents on recombinant cells used to make new drugs could be easily circumvented by reliance on the exhaustion doctrine, the deleterious effects on the pharmaceutical industry could be even greater than in the agricultural arena.”

Additionally, a group of 22 colleges, universities, and research organizations led by the Wisconsin Alumni Research (WARF) writes, the Bayh-Dole Act “was designed to encourage public access to federally funded inventions through the use of the patent system and collaboration between research institutions and private sector entities. Reversing the Federal Circuit would undermine this fundamental objective of Congress. To ensure the ongoing success of Bayh-Dole and the technology transfer system, this Court should affirm the Federal Circuit’s holding that Bowman infringed Monsanto’s patents by “making” new seeds.

The case concerns the infringement of Monsanto’s patents associated with genetically engineered soybeans, which contain patented biotechnology that enables the plants to tolerate a widely-used herbicide. The soybeans are popular with growers nationwide, because Monsanto’s technology enables growers to apply the herbicide after their crops have been planted, mitigating the yield-robbing weeds in their field without harming the soybean plants. The petitioner in this case (Bowman) obtained soybeans containing the technology from a local grain elevator and, over nine years, reproduced them in violation of the patents.

Other amici who filed briefs in support of Monsanto’s position include, the numerous biotech companies and numerous state soybean American Soybean Association associations, American Sugarbeet Growers, Growers for Biotechnology, BayhDole25 Inc., BSA/the Software Alliance, CHS, Inc., CropLife America, CropLife International, National Corn Growers Association, National Association of Wheat Growers, Pioneer Hi-Bred and (WLF). the Washington Legal Foundation
Interested parties can access more information about the case, its history, Monsanto’s brief, amicus briefs, and the U.S. government’s brief online at: www.innovationatstake.com.

About Monsanto Company Monsanto Company is a leading global provider of technology-based solutions and agricultural products that improve farm productivity and food quality. Monsanto remains focused on enabling both small-holder and large-scale farmers to produce more from their land while conserving more of our world’s natural resources such as water and energy. To learn more about our business and our commitments, please visit: www.monsanto.com. Follow our business on Twitter® at www.twitter.com/MonsantoCo, on the company blog, Beyond the Rows at www.monsantoblog.com, or subscribe to our News Release RSS Feed.

The case concerns the infringement of Monsanto’s patents associated with genetically engineered soybeans, which contain patented biotechnology that enables the plants to tolerate a widely-used herbicide. The soybeans are popular with growers nationwide, because Monsanto’s technology enables growers to apply the herbicide after their crops have been planted, mitigating the yield-robbing weeds in their field without harming the soybean plants. The petitioner in this case (Bowman) obtained soybeans containing the technology from a local grain elevator and, over nine years, reproduced them in violation of the patents.

The full article is at Monsanto Files Brief in Bowman v. Monsanto — AgProfessional.

The full text is at Friday Round-Up — Bowman v. Monsanto is a “case to watch” – SCOTUS Blog.

As a farmer who is active on social media, I’ve seen a lot of posts online about how corporations control farms or how farmers are slaves to “Big Ag.” Some people claim we are beholden to companies and must sign unfair contracts to be privileged enough to use their biotech seed.  They also claim the contracts rope us into buying other inputs like pesticides and herbicides from the same company.

The full text is at Opinion: My Family Farm Isn’t Under “Corporate Control” — CNN

Here are links to briefs recently filed by petitioner Bowman and his amici, with some brief commentary:

Petitioner (Vernon Bowman) argues that an authorized sale of recombinant seeds exhausts patent rights in progeny seeds that were not themselves the subject of an authorized sale. He bases this argument on a theory that subsequent generations of seeds are “embodied” in the first-generation authorized seeds. Bowman is apparently attempting to leverage the Supreme Court’s questionable use of the term “embodies” with respect to method patents in Quanta. He also argues that production of progeny seeds does not constitute “making” the seeds because the use of genetically modified seeds inherently results in the production of progeny seeds. Bowman contends that contract law provides adequate remedies to owners of patents on self-replicating technologies.

The full text is at Briefs Filed by Petitioner and His Amici in Bowman v. Monsanto – Holman’s Biotech IP Blog.

In a brief filed ahead of oral arguments set for next month, Monsanto told the court to reject the claim by farmer Vernon Bowman that Monsanto’s rights to the seeds were exhausted because it allowed them to be…

The full article is at Monsanto Asks High Court to Uphold Seed Patent Win — Law360.

Monsanto Files Brief in Bowman v Monsanto,
Urges Continued Patent Protection for Advances in Agriculture, Other Industries

Downloads: Full Brief for Respondents / Excerpts from the Brief / Press Release

WASHINGTON, Jan. 17 – Monsanto filed its brief last evening with the U.S. Supreme Court in the case of Bowman v. Monsanto. The brief highlights the crucial role that patent protection plays in fostering and protecting U.S. innovation, both in agricultural biotechnology and across a broad range of industries that deliver benefits to millions of Americans. Affirming Monsanto’s ability to enforce its patent rights in the case is critical to promoting continued research in biotechnology and other key fields, as companies, universities, and research institutions rely on patent law to recoup their R&D costs and protect against unauthorized copying of their inventions.

The case concerns the infringement of Monsanto’s patents associated with genetically engineered soybeans, which contain patented biotechnology that enables the plants to tolerate a widely-used herbicide. The soybeans are popular with growers nationwide, because Monsanto’s technology enables growers to apply the herbicide after their crops have been planted, mitigating the yield-robbing weeds in their field without harming the soybean plants. The petitioner in this case (Bowman) obtained soybeans containing the technology from a local grain elevator and, over nine years, reproduced them in violation of the patents.

“The U.S. patent system has played a pivotal role in incenting innovation and spurring the advancement of many of our nation’s vital industries,” said David Snively, Executive Vice President and General Counsel for Monsanto. “In this case, this system has supported the discovery and expansion of a novel science that has revolutionized agriculture, enabling growers to produce more food while they also conserve more natural resources.”

“What’s at stake is some of the most innovative research on the planet – not only in agriculture, but in industries from medicine to environmental science that rely on patent systems to make R&D investments economically viable,” Snively added. “If companies and universities can’t count on their inventions being protected, few will continue to invest the amounts needed to create a new seed, a new medicine, or another new technology.”

The United States filed a “friend of the court” (amicus curiae) brief in support of Monsanto’s position. The government explained that Bowman clearly violated Monsanto’s patent rights when he made unauthorized copies of Monsanto’s technology, and underscored that permitting this type of conduct to occur would jeopardize the incentive to invest in future innovations. The U.S. government’s brief further noted that “the potential consequences…are not limited to genetically modified crops. The Court’s decision could also affect the enforcement of patents for man-made cell lines, DNA molecules, some nanotechnologies and other technologies that involve self-replicating features.”

“Notably, the United States is urging the Supreme Court to rule in favor of patent protection — essentially, to rule in favor of innovation — in this important case. As the government’s brief explains, the courts below and in prior cases have correctly ruled in Monsanto’s favor, and if the Supreme Court were to rule otherwise, it could seriously erode the incentive to invest in critical research and product development that the patent system makes economically viable — not just in agriculture, but in biotechnology, nanotechnologies, and other fields across the innovation economy. What’s at stake is the innovation that helps feed the world, improve lives, create jobs, and enable America to keep its competitive edge.”

The full text of the U.S. government’s filing is available though InnovationatStake.com.