Byron White

“ And the settlement of an interference in which the only interests at stake are those of the adversaries, as in the case of a dispute over relative priority only and where possible invalidity, because of known prior art, is not involved, may well be consistent with the general policy favoring settlement of litigation. But the present case involves a less innocuous setting. Singer and Gegauf agreed to settle an interference, at least in part, to prevent an open fight over validity. ”

“ The result was that in April 1956 Singer and Gegauf entered a general cross-licensing agreement providing that the parties were not to attack one another's patent applications 'directly or indirectly,' not to do anything to restrict one another's claims in patents or applications, and to facilitate the allowance to one another of 'claims as broad as possible.' In August 1956 the Patent Office declared the anticipated interference. ”

“ Singer and Gegauf settled the interference pursuant to their prior agreement: Singer withdrew its interfering claims and in April 1957 the Patent Office dissolved the interference proceeding before it had ever reached the litigation stage. 37 CFR § 1.262. Eventually the Gegauf patent issued and was sold to Singer as part of the concerted action to exclude the Japanese which is involved in the first branch of the case, supra, p. 197.
In itself the desire to secure broad claims in a patent may well be unexceptionable-when purely unilateral action is involved. ”