United States v. Line Material Co.
United States v. Line Material Co., 333 U.S. 287 (1948), is a decision of the United States Supreme Court limiting the doctrine of the 1926 General Electric decision, excusing price fixing in patent license agreements. The Line Material Court held that cross-licenses between two manufacturer competitors, providing for fixing the prices of the licensed products and providing that one of the manufacturers would license other manufacturers under the patents of each manufacturer, subject to similar price fixing, violated Sherman Act § 1. The Court further held that the licensees who, with knowledge of such arrangements, entered into the price-fixing licenses thereby became party to a hub-and-spoke conspiracy in violation of Sherman Act § 1.
This is the patented Schultz dropout fuse cutout
Justice Stanley Reed delivered the judgment of a closely divided Court
United States v. General Electric Co.
United States v. General Electric Co., 272 U.S. 476 (1926), is a decision of the United States Supreme Court holding that a patentee who has granted a single license to a competitor to manufacture the patented product may lawfully fix the price at which the licensee may sell the product.
GE's patent on the tungsten filament lamp, US Pat 1,018,502 – one of the patents that the Supreme Court said completely covered the manufacture and sale of incandescent light bulbs
GE tungsten filament lamp embodying the invention of US Pat 1,018,502 – one of those involved in the 1926 US v GE litigation