Bowman v. Monsanto Company
United States Supreme Court
133 S. Ct. 1761 (2013)
Monsanto Company (plaintiff) patented genetically modified, herbicide-resistant soybean seeds and sold them only under license agreements barring purchasers from harvesting and replanting seeds from the resulting crop. Vernon Bowman (defendant) bought licensed Monsanto seeds each season for his first planting, but for his riskier second crop each year he instead bought and planted commodity seeds from a grain elevator — seeds federal law allowed elevators to sell only for consumption, not for replanting — doing this for eight consecutive years. When Monsanto discovered the practice, it sued for patent infringement; the district court and Federal Circuit both ruled for Monsanto, awarding over $84,000 in damages, and Bowman sought Supreme Court review.
Whether the authorized sale of a patented item gives the purchaser the right to use or resell that item, so long as the purchaser does not make new copies of it.