Stanford University v. Roche Molecular Systems, Inc.

Stanford v. Roche
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued February 28, 2011 Decided June 6, 2011
Full case name	Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University, Petitioner v. Roche Molecular Systems, Inc., et al.
Docket no.	09-1159
Citations	563 U.S. 776 (more) 131 S. Ct. 2188; 180 L. Ed. 2d 1; 2011 U.S. LEXIS 4183; 79 U.S.L.W. 4407; 98 U.S.P.Q.2d (BNA) 1761; 68 A.L.R. Fed. 2d 617; 22 Fla. L. Weekly Fed. S 1069
Case history
Prior	487 F. Supp. 2d 1099 (N.D. Cal. 2007); 563 F. Supp. 2d 1016 (N.D. Cal. 2008); affirmed in part, vacated in part, 583 F.3d 832 (Fed. Cir. 2009); cert. granted, 562 U.S. 1001 (2010).
Court membership
Chief Justice John Roberts Associate Justices Antonin Scalia · Anthony Kennedy Clarence Thomas · Ruth Bader Ginsburg Stephen Breyer · Samuel Alito Sonia Sotomayor · Elena Kagan
Case opinions
Majority	Roberts, joined by Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas, Alito, Sotomayor, Kagan
Concurrence	Sotomayor
Dissent	Breyer, joined by Ginsburg
Laws applied
Bayh–Dole Act, 35 U.S.C. §§ 200–212

Stanford University v. Roche Molecular Systems, Inc., 563 U.S. 776 (2011), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held that title in a patented invention vests first in the inventor, even if the inventor is a researcher at a federally funded lab subject to the 1980 Bayh–Dole Act.^[1] The judges affirmed the common understanding of U.S. constitutional law that inventors originally own inventions they make, and contractual obligations to assign those rights to third parties are secondary.^[2]