A divided federal appeals court upheld a $371.2 million award in favor of C.R. Bard Inc in a long-running patent infringement dispute with W.L. Gore & Associates over vascular grafts. The U.S. Federal Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C. said there was “substantial” evidence to support a 2007 Arizona jury verdict that Gore, the maker of Gore-Tex, willfully infringed a Bard patent through its sale of the grafts. Shares of Bard rose as much as 3.7 percent after the decision. Prosthetic vascular grafts are used to bypass or replace blood vessels to ensure sufficient blood flow to various parts of the body.
