In the 2010 case Global-Tech Appliances, Inc. v. SEB S.A., the U.S Supreme Court ruled that a party can be held liable for induced patent infringement under 35 U.S.C §271(b) if they have "willful blindness" towards the existence of a patent, even if they do not have actual knowledge of it. The dispute began when SEB S.A., a French company that owns patents for cool-touch deep fryers, sued Global-Tech Appliances and Pentalpha Enterprises for selling copycat versions to American companies like Sunbeam Products and Fingerhut Corp. While Pentalpha argued that they were unaware of SEB's patent at the time of production due to their own independent development process, evidence showed that they had copied an existing product without checking its patent status - which led to them being found guilty by both district court and federal circuit court before reaching Supreme Court.

In the dissenting opinion for Global-Tech Appliances, Inc. v. SEB S.A., Justice Kennedy argued that the majority's decision to apply a "willful blindness" standard in determining induced patent infringement was not supported by existing law or precedent and could potentially lead to unjust results. He contended that this new standard would allow parties who were genuinely ignorant of an existing patent to be held liable for infringement if they failed to take steps deemed reasonable by the court, even though such steps are not required under current law. Furthermore, he expressed concern that this approach might discourage innovation and competition as companies may avoid certain areas of research out of fear of inadvertently infringing on unknown patents.