[00:00:00] Speaker 04:
This is case number 20, 1257, Chen against Zhang.

[00:00:05] Speaker 04:
We will proceed with counsel as before.

[00:00:07] Speaker 04:
Okay, Mr. Zhang, we're ready.

[00:00:11] Speaker 00:
May I please the court?

[00:00:13] Speaker 00:
The district court in Chen 2 made two errors in dismissing the case.

[00:00:18] Speaker 00:
First, under Ninth Circuit law, the district court is required to consider the five Ghazali factors, but the district court never waited.

[00:00:27] Speaker 00:
under the Gazali factors, which this court can evaluate independently, the case should not be dismissed.

[00:00:36] Speaker 00:
Second, the district court made a finding that Dr. Chan consented to the dismissal of his case in Chan 2.

[00:00:44] Speaker 00:
The findings in the case made it crystal clear that Dr. Chan opposed the motion to dismiss.

[00:00:50] Speaker 00:
He entered into a stipulation with the defendants for a short stay, but he never consented

[00:00:56] Speaker 00:
to dismissal.

[00:00:58] Speaker 00:
So that finding is an error.

[00:01:01] Speaker 02:
Finally, defendant... Let me ask you, even if we agree with you on both of those points, we have the authority to affirm the judgment of the district court on any ground.

[00:01:13] Speaker 02:
And your friend on the other side argues that we should affirm it.

[00:01:18] Speaker 02:
Assuming we affirm on Chan 1, we should affirm in this case

[00:01:24] Speaker 02:
because based on race judicata and collateral estoppel principles.

[00:01:29] Speaker 02:
Why isn't that the case, assuming that we would affirm the Chen 1 determinations?

[00:01:39] Speaker 00:
Under that situation, at least the 261 patent in Chen 2, that part of the case should still proceed.

[00:01:49] Speaker 00:
because that pattern was not issued when Chan-1 was filed.

[00:01:54] Speaker 00:
It was issued three months after Chan-1 was filed.

[00:01:57] Speaker 02:
And Chan-1 was under a very fast... Let me ask you this question, though.

[00:02:01] Speaker 02:
With respect to the 261, I have a couple questions.

[00:02:04] Speaker 02:
One is, is the claims of inventorship are identical as it relates to the 261?

[00:02:14] Speaker 02:
In other words, the very contributions that you asserted in the prior case

[00:02:18] Speaker 02:
are the same contributions that you claim justify inventorship in your name under the 261, right?

[00:02:30] Speaker 00:
The actions of Dr. Chen that led to a claim of joint inventorship are the same, but you have to co-relate that to the actual claims of the patent under dispute, and the district court judge should be the one doing that.

[00:02:46] Speaker 02:
Well, every claim

[00:02:47] Speaker 02:
in the 261 relates to the A series compound, correct?

[00:02:55] Speaker 00:
It does, but it has additional limitations as well.

[00:02:58] Speaker 02:
Okay, but you don't actually assert that any particular claim was, that you're entitled to inventorship on any particular claim, isn't that right?

[00:03:15] Speaker 02:
You just said on every single claim.

[00:03:18] Speaker 00:
That's true.

[00:03:20] Speaker 00:
We have not specifically pointed to a particular claim in the pleading in the complaint.

[00:03:26] Speaker 00:
However, in the complaint Paragraph 76, Dr. Chen did say that he conducted in vivo mouse studies, including choosing the formulations designed by him.

[00:03:34] Speaker 00:
So, you know, that has relevance to some of the limitations in the claims.

[00:03:41] Speaker 00:
But the point really is the difficult judge should be the one that makes that determination first.

[00:03:50] Speaker 03:
And this is Judge Toronto.

[00:03:52] Speaker 03:
Do I understand right or do I think I remember correctly in your gray brief after the red brief said, claim preclusion, issue preclusion, you came back in the gray brief and spoke about how the 261 patent was not part of the first case.

[00:04:14] Speaker 03:
Joint inventorship depends on the particular claims.

[00:04:18] Speaker 03:
Nobody has said anything about the particular claims.

[00:04:21] Speaker 03:
You don't say anything in your Great Brief at all about the three patents that are in both cases in responding to the Red Brief's argument for either claim or issue preclusion.

[00:04:40] Speaker 00:
We do agree with the defendants that the disposition of the first case will have a great impact

[00:04:47] Speaker 00:
on the second case.

[00:04:50] Speaker 00:
But again, that's an issue that the trial judge had the occasion to consider, but he didn't consider those factors on whether preclusion actually applies.

[00:05:00] Speaker 00:
And also, when we were submitting these briefs, the court's case opinion in Dana Farber versus Ono Farmer hasn't come out yet.

[00:05:09] Speaker 00:
So we believe there's actually a change in law which may actually prevent the application of issue preclusion

[00:05:17] Speaker 00:
on these patents, and that's another issue that the trial court should consider.

[00:05:25] Speaker 03:
We would be considering Dana-Farber, would we not, in the Gen 1 case?

[00:05:33] Speaker 03:
I mean, it's governing law, governing the legal analysis of the Joint Inventorship Claim.

[00:05:44] Speaker 00:
So that is correct, yes.

[00:05:46] Speaker 00:
So it will really depend on not just the outcome of the chain one appeal, but also what is the basis for a potential affirmance.

[00:06:02] Speaker 00:
During the trial and during the judgment issued in the district court during that time period, Dana Farber was not available and Dana Farber actually

[00:06:12] Speaker 00:
said that even if a joint inventor's contribution was published in a journal article, in a journal of experimental medicine in that case, it could still be considered.

[00:06:23] Speaker 00:
In the case below, in chain one, we never really considered Dr. Chen's contribution in his Nature Medicine paper that's published in early 2004 or the end of 2003, it depends on if it's online or in print.

[00:06:40] Speaker 00:
During that time, the RD project

[00:06:42] Speaker 00:
the drug discovery project had already been underway for almost a year.

[00:06:46] Speaker 00:
And the facts parallel actually are very similar.

[00:06:51] Speaker 00:
In the Dana-Farber case, method pattern, just like the 689 pattern claims in our case, in that case, the general experimental medicine disclosure was attacking PD-1 receptor called possibly a treat cancer.

[00:07:11] Speaker 00:
In our case, the Nature Medicine article's disclosure was attacking the androgen receptor in these drug-resistant prostate cancer patients could be useful to treat this type of cancer.

[00:07:28] Speaker 00:
So the factual parallel is actually very similar.

[00:07:31] Speaker 00:
Because of this changing law, I think the issue of preclusion issue will have to be reconsidered.

[00:07:40] Speaker 02:
But to the extent that all that evidence existed, you're not saying that evidence didn't exist at the time of the Chen 1?

[00:07:50] Speaker 00:
It existed, and it was actually in the trial record as well in Chen 1.

[00:07:56] Speaker 00:
But because the court relied on the then prevailing law in deciding Chen 1, and now there's intervening changing law, whether they can

[00:08:07] Speaker 00:
whether the district court can then apply rest judicata on Chan 2, again, is the issue that the district court judge on remand should consider.

[00:08:23] Speaker 02:
But you could have made the same arguments that were made in the Dana-Farber case in the first case, correct?

[00:08:38] Speaker 02:
It's not an intervening change in the law.

[00:08:40] Speaker 02:
It's just an opinion talking about what the law is.

[00:08:46] Speaker 00:
Well, before in Hess, there was the law was that if something is already published, it's in the public domain, then it enters the storehouse of common knowledge.

[00:09:00] Speaker 00:
Then it's not, you can't rely on that as a for joint inventorship, and that's in Filana as well.

[00:09:07] Speaker 00:
So we do believe there's a changing law.

[00:09:12] Speaker 04:
And that's an issue.

[00:09:13] Speaker 04:
Well, let me just point out that the facts in Dana Farber, as you know, were quite different.

[00:09:21] Speaker 04:
There was collaboration.

[00:09:23] Speaker 04:
There were trips from one country to another, personal meetings, exchanges of information.

[00:09:32] Speaker 04:
And certainly the facts in that case contributed

[00:09:37] Speaker 04:
to the analysis.

[00:09:39] Speaker 04:
Now, I agree that Dana-Farber did not change the law.

[00:09:43] Speaker 04:
It applied the law to that particular case.

[00:09:46] Speaker 04:
And so I think to be straightforward, it's helpful to guide as to how the law, in your view, applies in this case.

[00:10:02] Speaker 00:
Your Honor, in Dana-Farber, the two groups of the mentors joined the mentors did have a falling out after the Cambridge mentors decided to file a provisional patent application.

[00:10:12] Speaker 00:
What does that have to do with it?

[00:10:15] Speaker 00:
So the collaboration did not go all the way through to the end.

[00:10:19] Speaker 00:
In our case, Dr. Chen was an active participant in all the ASAR studies for the RD series.

[00:10:25] Speaker 00:
So there was collaboration.

[00:10:27] Speaker 00:
The factual analogy, the factual parallel

[00:10:31] Speaker 00:
between our case and Dana-Farber are really strong.

[00:10:36] Speaker 00:
So we believe Dana-Farber could apply to the side effects in our case and compel a different result from Chen1.

[00:10:52] Speaker 00:
But then again, our main argument really is for Chen2 involving a different pattern,

[00:11:01] Speaker 00:
with different factual allegations as well in the complaint.

[00:11:08] Speaker 00:
Cheng Tu should not be dismissed without an analysis.

[00:11:18] Speaker 04:
Okay, that's the rebuttal signal.

[00:11:21] Speaker 04:
Any more questions at this time for Mr. Tang?

[00:11:26] Speaker 02:
No.

[00:11:28] Speaker 04:
All right, we'll hear from Mr. Sapko and we'll save your rebuttal.

[00:11:33] Speaker 04:
Okay, Mr. Sapko.

[00:11:36] Speaker 01:
Good morning again, Your Honors, and may it please the Court.

[00:11:40] Speaker 01:
As an initial matter, I'd like to directly address the two errors that my colleague identified.

[00:11:47] Speaker 01:
First, he said the District Court erred by not considering the Ghazali factors.

[00:11:52] Speaker 01:
I don't believe there's a single case that's been cited by either side.

[00:11:57] Speaker 01:
that's identified the failure to expressly address the Ghazali factors as reversible error.

[00:12:03] Speaker 01:
Instead, the law in the Ninth Circuit is clear that the appellate court conducts an independent review of the Ghazali factors.

[00:12:12] Speaker 01:
Second, counsel said that Judge Klausner erred by finding that Dr. Chen consented to the motion to dismiss.

[00:12:20] Speaker 01:
That's not what happened below.

[00:12:22] Speaker 01:
As the record clearly shows,

[00:12:24] Speaker 01:
Judge Klausner determined based on the local rules of the Central District of California that he was authorized to construe the untimely opposition to the motion to dismiss as consent to that motion.

[00:12:38] Speaker 01:
The issue before this court is really whether Judge Klausner abused his discretion in granting the motion to dismiss on procedural grounds.

[00:12:49] Speaker 01:
And the facts are compelling here.

[00:12:52] Speaker 01:
Dr. Chen,

[00:12:53] Speaker 01:
no question, filed his opposition late.

[00:12:57] Speaker 01:
That reflected a blatant disregard of the district court's local rules, and really was an affront to Judge Klausner, who just the day before had issued his decision in the Chen 1 case, and the opposition that Dr. Chen filed all but ignored that decision.

[00:13:13] Speaker 01:
And Dr. Chen's briefing.

[00:13:15] Speaker 02:
Council said, I mean, even if the approach to this litigation was

[00:13:23] Speaker 02:
was problematic.

[00:13:25] Speaker 02:
It's pretty clear in the Ninth Circuit that dismissal as a sanction is a big step, right?

[00:13:35] Speaker 01:
No question, Your Honor.

[00:13:36] Speaker 01:
It is a big step, but the facts that were before Judge Klausner, I think, demonstrate that he did not abuse his discretion.

[00:13:46] Speaker 01:
In the proceedings below, the supposed reason why Dr. Chen filed his opposition brief late was because he was relying on the stipulation to stay the case.

[00:13:58] Speaker 01:
Now, the local rules say and the judge's standing orders say that you don't rely on a stipulation until it's been entered by the court.

[00:14:06] Speaker 01:
But even if that was the reason why the opposition was late,

[00:14:11] Speaker 01:
The opposition that was filed made no attempt to explain the implications of the Chen 1 decision on the issues before the court and the motion to dismiss.

[00:14:23] Speaker 03:
It was the whole reason.

[00:14:24] Speaker 03:
Did Judge Klausner make that point?

[00:14:27] Speaker 03:
Did he look to the content of the late opposition that was filed in his decision?

[00:14:36] Speaker 01:
I believe he did, Your Honor.

[00:14:38] Speaker 01:
If you look at Joint Appendix page 1, in the two sentences preceding his reference to the inexplicable late filing, Judge Klausner wrote, and I quote, plaintiff did not file his opposition to the motion until November 7, 2019, only 11 days before the hearing date.

[00:14:58] Speaker 01:
Neither plaintiff's opposition nor the accompanying declaration, DE 43,

[00:15:04] Speaker 01:
attempt to provide justification for plaintiffs failing to comply with this court's local rules and the court finds not.

[00:15:13] Speaker 03:
I guess I understood those words and I'm still understanding those words to mean no explanation for lateness.

[00:15:19] Speaker 03:
I took you to be making a distinct point, no explanation to distinguish the substance of the just issued ruling in the previous case.

[00:15:32] Speaker 01:
That was my point, Your Honor, and I think that's a fair reading of Judge Klausner's use of the word inexplicable here.

[00:15:40] Speaker 01:
He clearly read the papers, and that's indicated by the comments that I just read.

[00:15:47] Speaker 01:
And it's worth noting that at no time below did Dr. Chen offer any excuse for either the late filing or explain why the Chen 1 decision

[00:16:02] Speaker 01:
didn't bar the claims that he was trying to pursue below.

[00:16:06] Speaker 03:
Can I just change the subject just a little bit?

[00:16:11] Speaker 03:
Assume for purposes of this question that the actual ground of dismissal would require a vacator and remand.

[00:16:22] Speaker 03:
Why would we not leave either all four of the patents

[00:16:31] Speaker 03:
or at least the 261 for a remand to consider questions of preclusion?

[00:16:41] Speaker 01:
Your Honor, if the court were to conclude that Judge Klausner did abuse his discretion in granting the motion to dismiss on procedural grounds, this court certainly has the authority to look at those issues in the first instance.

[00:16:57] Speaker 01:
And I believe there's enough information in the record before it

[00:17:00] Speaker 01:
to reach the conclusion that those claims are precluded.

[00:17:05] Speaker 01:
However, it's probably most efficient for this court to revamp for specific findings on that.

[00:17:11] Speaker 01:
However, I don't think the court needs to go there.

[00:17:15] Speaker 01:
The court can find, based on an independent review of the Ghazali factors, that Judge Klausner did not abuse his discretion.

[00:17:24] Speaker 01:
And the Ghazali case itself is instructive as to the scope of a district court's discretion in enforcing its local rules.

[00:17:33] Speaker 01:
In that case, the court affirmed a grant of a motion to dismiss based solely on the showing that the pro se plaintiff had notice of the motion and ample time to respond.

[00:17:50] Speaker 01:
Here, Dr. Chen was clearly represented by competent counsel, so he doesn't have those excuses.

[00:17:57] Speaker 02:
But... Counsel, what role does the fact that the motion to amend to add the request that certain inventors be struck from Chen Wang was denied, and that that then... And denied partially because the court found it to be inappropriate

[00:18:20] Speaker 02:
sort of retaliatory action, what role does the fact that that had just happened when the new case was filed have with respect to the court's discretion under the Ghazali factors?

[00:18:37] Speaker 01:
Well, I think the facts in the Chen Wan case certainly informed the judge's decision and certainly colored his view of this case.

[00:18:50] Speaker 01:
As you know, the motion to amend to add additional defendants and try to have them stricken was denied below.

[00:18:59] Speaker 01:
It was denied for undue delay and it was also denied as apparently in bad faith.

[00:19:06] Speaker 01:
So it was imperative that Dr. Chen explain in Chen 2

[00:19:13] Speaker 01:
why he, that decision, why he wasn't trying to avoid that decision through the complaint that he filed in Chen 2.

[00:19:22] Speaker 01:
His proper recourse was to appeal that decision in Chen 1.

[00:19:27] Speaker 01:
And all of those issues were laid out in the briefing on the motion to dismiss below.

[00:19:33] Speaker 01:
That issue also is relevant, the timing issue is relevant to the arguments with respect to the 261 patent.

[00:19:43] Speaker 01:
In the briefing, Dr. Chen argues that he simply didn't have time to bring the 261 patent into the Chen 1 case, but that's just not accurate.

[00:19:54] Speaker 01:
The 261 patent, while it wasn't issued at the time the complaint in Chen 1 was filed, it issued only three months after the complaint was filed.

[00:20:03] Speaker 01:
It issued seven months before the close of fact discovery in that case and nine months

[00:20:08] Speaker 01:
before the motion to amend was filed.

[00:20:11] Speaker 01:
There is absolutely no reason why Dr. Chen could not have brought that claim with respect to the 261 patent in the Chen 1 case.

[00:20:20] Speaker 01:
And it's that failure to do that that really supports the claim preclusion arguments here.

[00:20:27] Speaker 01:
Claim preclusion isn't limited to just the claims that were actually brought in another case.

[00:20:34] Speaker 01:
It also encompasses claims that could have been brought

[00:20:37] Speaker 01:
And as reflected in Dr. Chen's reply brief in this case, he's relying on exactly the same alleged inventive contributions with respect to the 261 patent that he relied on in Chen 1 with respect to the other three patents and Judge Klausner rejected, including on credibility grounds.

[00:21:00] Speaker 01:
So that claim should have been brought there.

[00:21:02] Speaker 01:
And while the court doesn't need to actually make a finding with respect to claim preclusion, I think the public policy against vexatious and piecemeal litigation relates directly to the public's interest in expeditious resolution of litigation gazali factor.

[00:21:22] Speaker 01:
So it's appropriate for the court to consider those facts.

[00:21:27] Speaker 01:
If the court is to apply an independent review of the Ghazali factors, I would submit that at least four of the five of those factors strongly support the judge's exercise of his discretion in granting the motion to dismiss below.

[00:21:44] Speaker 01:
We just talked about the public's interest in avoiding duplicative litigation.

[00:21:50] Speaker 01:
But with respect to the court's need to manage its docket,

[00:21:55] Speaker 01:
that the local rule that was violated here was plainly intended to give the judge sufficient time to consider the papers before a hearing.

[00:22:04] Speaker 01:
Dr. Chen cut the court's time in half filing the opposition only 10 days before the hearing and never even asked for leave to file that opposition out of time or explained why he filed it out of time.

[00:22:21] Speaker 01:
With respect to the risk of prejudice to the defendant's factors, as the Ninth Circuit explained in the Urish case that was cited in our briefs, the degree of prejudice that has to be shown in order to justify dismissal on procedural grounds is related to the strength of the excuse for failing to comply.

[00:22:42] Speaker 01:
Dr. Chen offered no excuse to Judge Klausner, and it's only on this appeal that he said he was relying on the unentered

[00:22:50] Speaker 01:
Again, directly contrary to the court's local rules and standing orders.

[00:22:57] Speaker 01:
Given the weakness of that excuse, under the Ghazali line of cases, under Yurish, there's not a lot of prejudice that needs to be shown in order to support dismissal.

[00:23:09] Speaker 01:
Here, I would submit that just putting defendants in the position of having to file a reply brief that the court might not have had adequate time to consider before the hearing is probably sufficient.

[00:23:20] Speaker 01:
But even more to the point, allowing Dr. Chen to proceed with a duplicative litigation would have prejudiced defendants in having to continue to fight the same issues that they just won in Chen won when Dr. Chen should have brought those issues before the court in the Chen won case.

[00:23:42] Speaker 01:
Public policy favoring disposition of cases on the merits

[00:23:46] Speaker 01:
Again, this is an issue that Dr. Chen argued in his briefs suggests that Dr. Chen should have his day in court with respect to the 261 patent.

[00:23:57] Speaker 03:
Well, I would say that... This is Judge Toronto.

[00:23:59] Speaker 03:
Can I just ask something?

[00:24:00] Speaker 03:
I should know this.

[00:24:02] Speaker 03:
Can you clarify the precise timing?

[00:24:05] Speaker 03:
If Dr. Chen had filed the briefing opposition to the dismissal motion in a timely fashion,

[00:24:16] Speaker 03:
Would your reply to that have been due before the judge's ruling in Chen Wan?

[00:24:25] Speaker 01:
So the brief was noticed for motion on November 18th.

[00:24:37] Speaker 01:
Our brief would have been due at least 14 days before that, so that would have been November 4th.

[00:24:44] Speaker 01:
and the decision came out on November 6th.

[00:24:49] Speaker 03:
So, as it turns out... A timely filing would have put you to the burden of filing the reply because Gen 1 wouldn't have been out yet to save you from that.

[00:25:07] Speaker 01:
That's correct, Your Honor, but in that circumstance,

[00:25:12] Speaker 01:
suspect that we would have asked for leave to address that decision.

[00:25:18] Speaker 01:
But you're correct on the timing there, Your Honor.

[00:25:22] Speaker 01:
So I think my time is running out here.

[00:25:26] Speaker 01:
I'm happy to address further questions that the court has.

[00:25:30] Speaker 01:
But I do want to stress that the issue before this court is purely whether

[00:25:38] Speaker 01:
The district court judge abused his discretion in enforcing the local rules.

[00:25:44] Speaker 01:
And in the Ninth Circuit, it's a rare case indeed that an appellate court would question the exercise of discretion in connection with the application of the local rules.

[00:25:56] Speaker 01:
Under the facts of this case, where Dr. Chen never explained or never sought leave for filing an untimely motion, untimely opposition brief rather,

[00:26:07] Speaker 01:
and never even addressed the decision that supposedly was the reason for the delay in the first place.

[00:26:13] Speaker 01:
Under those facts, I submit that Judge Klausner acted well within his discretion.

[00:26:20] Speaker 04:
And unless I believe... Any more questions for Mr. Sebko?

[00:26:24] Speaker 03:
Not for me.

[00:26:25] Speaker 03:
No.

[00:26:26] Speaker 04:
Okay.

[00:26:27] Speaker 04:
Thank you.

[00:26:29] Speaker 04:
Thank you, Your Honor.

[00:26:29] Speaker 04:
Okay.

[00:26:29] Speaker 04:
All right.

[00:26:30] Speaker 04:
Mr. Tan, you have the last word.

[00:26:33] Speaker 00:
A few quick points.

[00:26:34] Speaker 00:
First, regarding the improper purpose finding in the denial of motion for leaving Chen Wan, the parties were in the middle of settlement talks at the time.

[00:26:43] Speaker 00:
So Judge Rio might have thought that this is a negotiation tactic.

[00:26:48] Speaker 00:
However, Chen too was filed after the settlement talks broke down to show that there was no improper purpose.

[00:26:55] Speaker 00:
Dr. Chen was only trying to correct inventorship, which has strong public policy

[00:27:03] Speaker 00:
underpinnings.

[00:27:06] Speaker 00:
And the reliance on the stipulation is not really the reason for our appeal.

[00:27:12] Speaker 00:
Our appeal is based on an erroneous fact-finding.

[00:27:16] Speaker 00:
When the docket filing makes it so apparent that the late filing of the opposition brief is because the party has stipulated to a short stay.

[00:27:26] Speaker 00:
So we are not saying that because we have a stipulation, the case cannot be dismissed, but only that the trial judge

[00:27:33] Speaker 00:
certainly knew about the stipulation, he denied it before he dismissed the case.

[00:27:38] Speaker 00:
So under those circumstances, there could be no reasonable SAC finding that Dr. Chen consented to dismissal.

[00:27:47] Speaker 00:
For the claim preclusion point that counsel made,

[00:27:52] Speaker 00:
We don't believe there can be a rule to say that if a new pattern issues after some pattern case has been filed, then that new pattern has to be brought into the original case.

[00:28:02] Speaker 00:
Such a rule will have a very far-reaching implication, and we don't believe it's a proper rule.

[00:28:10] Speaker 00:
A new pattern is a new entity.

[00:28:12] Speaker 00:
Rights under the new pattern arose when the pattern issues, and then a party can certainly file a new suit

[00:28:21] Speaker 00:
to assert those rights.

[00:28:25] Speaker 00:
So in this case, there is a very strong, regarding the gazelle factors, there's a very strong policy concern to resolve inventorship issues on the merits.

[00:28:35] Speaker 00:
As we know, these patents cover a pharmaceutical drug, Erleada.

[00:28:40] Speaker 00:
These patents are on the Orange Book.

[00:28:43] Speaker 00:
We know that they will be challenged.

[00:28:47] Speaker 00:
And if the inventorship issue is not resolved now, there could be

[00:28:52] Speaker 00:
more cases, many more cases, disputing it later on.

[00:28:56] Speaker 00:
So even just on that factor alone, plus the lack of prejudice, plus they definitely are less severe sanctions available for the district court, we believe an independent weighing of the Ghazili factors should

[00:29:15] Speaker 00:
can compel a result of a remand.

[00:29:17] Speaker 02:
I guess I'm not understanding how there could be many more cases when if we affirm the district court in Chen 1, then the inventorship issue as to the series A compounds is decided.

[00:29:34] Speaker 00:
Because the contributions of the other named inventors to the inventions are also

[00:29:45] Speaker 00:
put at issue by Dr. Chen.

[00:29:48] Speaker 00:
So, you know, there will be... We expect there will be disputes on that.

[00:30:00] Speaker 02:
But if you're not an inventor, what would be your standing to challenge the other inventors on the patent?

[00:30:11] Speaker 00:
Yes, if the Chen one is affirmed and Dr. Chen is no longer an inventor and the percussion issues we discussed before also came out against him, then yes, Dr. Chen probably will not be asserting inventorship on the first three patents.

[00:30:28] Speaker 00:
That's correct.

[00:30:30] Speaker 04:
Okay.

[00:30:33] Speaker 04:
Okay, I heard.

[00:30:34] Speaker 04:
Any more questions for Mr. Tom?

[00:30:37] Speaker 03:
No.

[00:30:39] Speaker 04:
Okay.

[00:30:40] Speaker 04:
I thank both counsel.

[00:30:42] Speaker 04:
The case is taken under submission.

[00:30:44] Speaker 04:
And that concludes this panel's argued cases for this morning.