Court Revives Volvo Boat Engine Patent, After Parties Settle

The Federal Circuit torpedoed an administrative tribunal’s decision to nix a boat-engine patent Volvo Penta of the Americas LLC had asserted in litigation.

More than two months after Volvo Penta and Brunswick Corp. reached a truce in a patent battle in federal courts in Virginia and Delaware, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit vacated an invalidity judgment by the Patent Trial and Appeal Board and sent the case back for further consideration.

The patent is embodied by Volvo Group unit’s 2015 Forward Drive, an engine popular with wakesurfers that puts more distance between them and a ...