The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit confirmed the exclusivity of the jurisdiction of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit for all patent matters, regardless of when a patent issue first becomes part of the case. CytoLogix Corporation v. Ventana Medical Systems, Inc., Case No. 07-2629 (1st. Cir., Jan. 17, 2008) (per curiam).
CytoLogix filed two separate actions against Ventana. One of the actions was a patent infringement claim; the other was an antitrust/misappropriation action. After two trials, both of which included claims from the other action, the court entered a final judgment on all the claims. There was never a formal consolidation of the cases until after the conclusion of the trials. Specifically, it was not until after the final judgment that the court entered an order stating that the actions were consolidated, nunc pro tunc, as of the commencement of the first trial. After the conclusion of the district court actions, CytoLogix filed two identical notices of appeal: one in the First Circuit and one in the Federal Circuit.
Ventana moved to dismiss the appeal in the First Circuit for lack of jurisdiction. CytoLogix opposed the dismissal, but conceded that the patent claim should have been transferred to the Federal Circuit. CytoLogix asked in the alternative that the entire appeal be transferred to the Federal Circuit instead of being dismissed.
The First Circuit dismissed the appeal filed in their court, but stated normally they would have transferred the matter to the Federal Circuit if there was not a co-filed appeal in that jurisdiction. The Court reasoned that once the two cases were consolidated, even though the consolidation occurred after a final judgment was entered, jurisdiction of the entire consolidated case was based at least in part on the patent laws. In reaching it's conclusion to relinquish jurisdiction, the First Circuit relied on 28 U.S.C. § 1295(a), which states that the Federal Circuit has exclusive jurisdiction of an appeal if the jurisdiction of district court was based, in whole or in part, on 28 U.S.C. § 1338.
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