米国特許登録前の販売行為によって特許消尽は生じるか？

米国最高裁判所はImpression Products v. Lexmark International判例の中で特許消尽とは販売行為から購入者に対して発生する権利では無く、特許権者の独占排他権に対する制限であるとしています。

The misstep in this logic is that the exhaustion doctrine is not a presumption about the authority that comes along with a sale; it is instead a limit on “the scope of the patentee’s rights.” United States v. General Elec. Co., 272 U. S. 476, 489 (1926) (emphasis added). The right to use, sell, or import an item exists independently of the Patent Act. What a patent adds—and grants exclusively to the patentee—is a limited right to prevent others from engaging in those practices. See Crown Die & Tool Co. v. Nye Tool & Machine Works, 261 U. S. 24, 35 (1923). Exhaustion extinguishes that exclusionary power. See Bloomer, 14 How., at 549 (the purchaser “exercises no rights created by the act of Congress, nor does he derive title to [the item] by virtue of the . . . exclusive privilege granted to the patentee”). As a result, the sale transfers the right to use, sell, or import because those are the rights that come along with ownership, and the buyer is free and clear of an infringement lawsuit because there is no exclusionary right left to enforce. Impression Products v. Lexmark International, 137 S. Ct. 1523, 1534 (2017)

よって、特許登録前には前提となる独占排他権が発生していませんので特許消尽の話にはならず、特許消尽が生じるのは特許登録後、というのが自然な解釈のように考えます。