U.S. Patent No. PP29,967 P2 (‘967) issued on December 11, 2018, for “Strawberry Plant Named ‘Malibu’.” It was issued to inventor/applicant John Larse of Watsonville, California. The assignee is Sweet Darling Sales, Inc., of Aptos, California, a subsidiary of Larse Farms, Inc., a strawberry farm and producer. This patent is a plant patent under 35 U.S.C. §161, which protects new and distinct cultivars of plants. According to the specification, the Latin name is Fragaria x ananassa, and the varietal denomination is ‘Malibu (MPEP 1601).
Figure 1 below illustrates the plant ‘Malibu’.
For plant patents, the utility requirement under 35 U.S.C. §101 is replaced with distinctiveness, and the ‘967 patent’s distinctiveness over the prior art as described in the specification was confirmed by a seed testing lab as a unique strawberry germplasm using Short Sequence Repeats (SSRs).
All plant patents have a 20 year term, and the ‘967 patent expires on June 28, 2037 (MPEP 2701).
The Cooperative Patent Classification is A01H (new plants or processes for obtaining them; plant reproduction by tissue culture techniques).
Plant patents are a unique type of patents issued by the USPTO, although only a very small number (about 1%) are actually issued each year. Keep in mind the plants not only must be distinct, but also new, which means they must invented (i.e., man-made or genetically modified), and asexually reproducible (i.e., not through seed propagation). Plant patents represent a facsinating area under U.S. patent law.
Please contact Yonaxis for more information on plant patents, or patents in general, if you have any questions.