McBurger has just developed a new method of preparing its products that greatly reduces the fat content and other medical problems associated with fast food. Although still in the developmental phase, McBurger has been very careful not to release any information regarding the process. The information is constantly under lock and key. Jerry, a competitor’s employee, took a public tour of McBurger University to evaluate going to work for McBurger. While on the tour, he accidentally saw the process being conducted in a small laboratory that was visible to everyone, but not part of the tour. Jerry realized that probably no one else would recognize the process, and said nothing. Jerry was able to duplicate McBurger’s process, and is now about to be promoted to vice-president of his company. Does McBurger have a claim against Jerry and his employer? What is the likely outcome? Discuss fully.
In my opinion and in the eyes of law , Mc Burger does not have any claim against Jerry and his employer as he currently has not filed the patent and as long as he does not file patent for the protection of the invention he cannot claim jerry for imitation.
Explanation:
This is because the company although tried to maintain privacy does not mentions anywhere about filing the patent for the said invention. If MC Burger has developed a new innovative method of producing healthy products , it should immediately file and appeal for a patent to protect its intellectual property from getting exploited or imitated by his competitors. Now that the patent has not been filed for patent protection against such duplication as done by the employee jerry, no claim can be made against him.
Thus no claim can be raised against jerry or his company as the Mc Burger has no valid proof about the idea being generated by him.
However he still has chance to file patent and declare jerry an infringer as he is the first inventor.
Likely Outcome:
One most important thing here to note is that the invention is in its development phase , which means the idea has already been given a practical implementation. So , the likely outcome will be :
If Mc Burger will succeed at completing the development of this invention first and will go to file patent , the invention will belong to him and will be i declared as infringed by Jerry and MC Burger can thus file an infringement lawsuit against him or his company as , the American patent law entertains only "First to Invent" rather than "First to file" system , which on showing the practical implementation first will make MC Burger the first inventor. Thus through filing patent first , The US Patent Law will declare MC burger the first inventor and invalidate its application or use by Jerry and his company or even award MC Burger , the compensation against imitation.
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McBurger has just developed a new method of preparing its products that greatly reduces the fat...