G.R. No. 118708 February 2, 1998
CRESER PRECISION SYSTEMS, INC., petitioner, vs. COURT OF APPEALS AND FLORO INTERNATIONAL CORP., respondents.

FACTS

Private respondent Floro International Corp. is a domestic corporation engaged in the manufacture and sale of military armaments. On January 23, 1990, it was granted Letters Patent No. UM-6938 for an aerial fuze by the Bureau of Patents, Trademarks and Technology Transfer (BPTTT). In November 1993, Floro discovered that petitioner Creser Precision Systems, Inc. had submitted samples of a similar aerial fuze to the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) for testing and was planning to bid and manufacture it commercially. Floro sent a demand letter to Creser on December 3, 1993, advising of its patent rights and warning of legal action. In response, on December 8, 1993, Creser filed a complaint for injunction and damages before the Regional Trial Court (RTC) of Quezon City, alleging it was the first and actual inventor of an aerial fuze denominated as “Fuze, PDR 77 CB4,” which it developed as early as December 1981 under the AFP’s Self-Reliance Defense Posture Program (SRDP) and began supplying to the AFP in 1986. Creser claimed Floro’s patented fuze was identical and prayed for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction to stop Floro from manufacturing and selling it. The RTC issued a temporary restraining order and, after hearings, granted the writ of preliminary injunction on December 29, 1993. Floro’s motion for reconsideration was denied on May 11, 1994. Floro then filed a petition for certiorari, mandamus, and prohibition with the Court of Appeals, which granted the petition on November 9, 1994, reversing the RTC’s orders and dismissing Creser’s complaint. Creser’s motion for reconsideration was denied, leading to this petition for review.

ISSUE

Whether the petitioner, Creser Precision Systems, Inc., which does not hold a patent for the aerial fuze, has a cause of action to file a complaint for injunction and damages against the patent holder, Floro International Corp., based on alleged infringement.

RULING

No. The Supreme Court affirmed the decision of the Court of Appeals. Under Section 42 of the Patent Law (R.A. 165), only a patentee or anyone possessing any right, title, or interest in and to the patented invention (which refers to the patentee’s successors-in-interest, assignees, or grantees) may bring a civil action for infringement. Since Creser admits it has no patent over the aerial fuze, it has no legal basis or cause of action for infringement. The right to maintain an infringement suit depends on the existence of a patent. An inventor without a patent has no common-law right to a monopoly of the invention; a patent grants the exclusive right to exclude others. Creser’s proper remedy, if it claims to be the true and actual inventor, is to file a petition for cancellation of Floro’s patent with the Director of Patents under Section 28 of the Patent Law within three years from the patent’s publication, which it failed to do. Floro, as the patentee, enjoys the presumption of validity as the first and true inventor. Therefore, the RTC acted without jurisdiction in granting the injunction, and the complaint was correctly dismissed.