Bowers v. Baystate Technologies
| Bowers v. Baystate Technologies | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Court | United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit |
| Full case name | Harold L. Bowers (doing business as HLB Technology) v. Baystate Technologies, Inc., |
| Decided | January 29th 2003 |
| Citation(s) | 320 F.3d 1317 |
| Holding | |
| Baystate performed a breach of contract by reverse engineering HLB Technology's software. The shrinkwrap license on HLB Technology's software preempts fair use rights given in copyright law. | |
| Court membership | |
| Judge(s) sitting | Randall Ray Rader, Raymond Charles Clevenger, Timothy Belcher Dyk |
| Case opinions | |
| Majority | Randall Ray Rader |
| Dissent | Timothy Belcher Dyk |
| Laws applied | |
| 17 U.S.C. § 117 | |
Bowers v. Baystate Technologies (320 F.3d 1317) was a U.S. Court of Appeals Federal Circuit case involving Harold L. Bowers (doing business as HLB Technology) and Baystate Technologies over patent infringement, copyright infringement, and breach of contract. In the case, the court found that Baystate had breached their contract by reverse engineering Bower's program, something expressly prohibited by a shrink wrap license that Baystate entered into upon purchasing a copy of Bower's software. This case is notable for establishing that license agreements can preempt fair use rights as well as expand the rights of copyright holders beyond those codified in US federal law.
Baystate Technologies, Inc ("Baystate") and HLB Technology ("Bowers") were competing companies which created add-ons that interacted with a computer aided design (CAD) program known as CADKEY.
Bowers was the patent holder of a system called Cadjet that simplified interfacing with CAD software, which he began to license commercially in 1989. Bower's initial software offering was later combined with a product called Geodraft that was produced by George W. Ford III (Ford) that inserted tolerances compliant with ANSI for features in a CAD design. Together, these products were marketed as Designer's Toolkit. The Designer's Toolkit was sold with a shrink wrap license that prohibited reverse engineering.
Baystate sold competing CADKEY tools including Draft-Pak version 1 and 2. According to the court filings, Baystate acquired a copy of Bowers' Designer's Toolkit, and three months later, Baystate released version 3 of Draft-Pak which substantially overlapped with the features offered by Designer's Toolkit.
In 1991, Baystate sued Bowers seeking declaratory judgement that 1) Baystate's products do not infringe on Bowers' patent 2) the patent is invalid, and 3) the patent is unenforceable. Bowers filed counter claims for copyright infringement, patent infringement, and breach of contract, contending that Baystate had reverse engineered Designer's Toolkit. At court, expert testimonial revealed "evidence of extensive and unusual similarities" between Draft-Pak and Designer's Toolkit, supporting Bowers' claim that Baystate had reverse engineered a copy of his software. The District Court of Massachusetts concluded that Bower's was entitled to damages, finding that the shrink wrap license tied to Bowers' software preempted any fair use case for reverse engineering as allowed by Copyright law. Baystate appealed the district courts decision.
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