Laches Bars Claim to Change Inventorship on Issued U.S. Patent -
On February 16, 2016, the Federal Circuit issued an opinion in a case captioned Hedwig Lismont v. Alexander Binzel Corp. This appeal arises from an...more
Producing "digital labels" is Patent Eligible under § 101 -
On February 6, 2016, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas (Marshall Division) issued a decision in a case captioned Gonzalez v. Infostream...more
Despite Amendments during Reexamination, Intervening Rights Not Found -
On February 10, 2016, the Federal Circuit issued an opinion in a case captioned Convolve, Inc., and Massachusetts Institute of Technology v. Compaq...more
On February 10, 2016, the Federal Circuit issued a nonprecedential opinion in a case captioned Driessen v. Sony Music Entertainment, Best Buy Stores, Fye, & Target Corp. addressing issues related to means-plus-function claims...more
On January 29, 2016, the Federal Circuit issued an Opinion in Avid Technology, Inc. v. Harmonic, Inc. in which the judgment of the District Court was vacated, and the case was remanded for a new trial on infringement. Avid...more
Coupon Patent Easily Found Invalid under § 101 -
On January 12, 2016, the District Court for the District of Delaware issued an opinion in a case captioned Motivation Innovations, LLC v. Petsmart, Inc. Plaintiff,...more
Business Method Patent Survives PTAB Review -
On January 22, 2016, the U.S. Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) issued a decision denying institution of a covered business method (CBM) patent review in a case captioned...more
Financial Services Patent Claims Invalid -
On January 20, 2016, the Federal Circuit issued an opinion in the case captioned Mortgage Grader, Inc. v. First Choice Loan Services Inc., NYLX, Inc. This case involves patent...more
Genband US LLC sued Metaswitch for infringement of claims of U.S. Patent No. 6,772,210 ("the '210 Patent") and U.S. Patent No 7,047,561 ("the '561 Patent") in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas...more
Generic Software Claims Found Ineligible under § 101 -
A common theme found in recent patent litigation is that software claims lacking detail are more likely to be found invalid under 35 U.S.C. § 101.
The U.S....more
Patent Eligibility Requires Consideration of the Claim as a Whole -
The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio (Eastern Division) issued an opinion on December 21, 2015 in the case captioned 01 Communique...more
Patent Claims (and Specification) Lacking in Detail Fail under 35 U.S.C. § 101 -
The Federal Circuit issued an opinion on December 28, 2015 in the case captioned Vehicle Intelligence and Safety LLC v. Mercedes-Benz USA,...more
On December 1, 2015, the International Trade Commission (ITC) rendered an opinion In the Matter of Certain Vision-Based Driver Assistance System Cameras, Components Thereof, and Products Containing the Same, investigation no....more
Two recent District Court decisions show examples of "weak" claims, which in the past would likely be found invalid as lacking novelty or being obvious, but today are struck down as being unpatentable under § 101. The cases...more
Most software or computer-related patent applications today include a number of different types of claims, such as method claims, device claims, and computer-readable medium (CRM) claims. Such CRM claims are usually directed...more
The Patent Trial and Appeal Board of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has likely seen an increase in the number of appealed rejections under 35 U.S.C. § 101 due to the Supreme Court's decision in Alice Corp. Pty. Ltd. v....more
Thomas Steed, Sourav Bhattacharya, and Sandeep Seshadrijois (collectively "Steed") filed a patent application entitled "Web-Integrated On-Line Financial Database System and Method for Debt Recovery," on April 6, 2004, with...more
10/6/2015
/ Due Diligence ,
Due Process ,
Evidence ,
Inventors ,
Obviousness ,
Patent Applications ,
Patent Litigation ,
Patent Trial and Appeal Board ,
Patents ,
Prior Art ,
Pro Se Litigants ,
Reduction to Practice ,
USPTO ,
Waivers
Traditional patent law holds that a patentee of a patent that survives reexamination is only entitled to infringement damages for the time period between the date of issuance of the original claims and the date of issuance of...more
9/22/2015
/ Claim Construction ,
Damages ,
Ex Partes Reexamination ,
Patent Amendments ,
Patent Infringement ,
Patent Litigation ,
Patents ,
Prior Art ,
Qualcomm ,
Scope of the Claim ,
USPTO
In Media Rights Technologies, Inc. v. Capital One Financial Corp. (September 4, 2015), the Federal Circuit first transformed a broadly described element in a claim into a means-plus-function claim term, and then found the...more
In Inline Plastics Corp. v. EasyPak, LLC, the Federal Circuit offered some bits of wisdom for patent application specification drafting, while applying well-known case law to conclude that claims are not limited to a specific...more
A recent decision by the Federal Circuit in JVC Kenwood Corp. v. Nero, Inc., decided August 17, 2015, involves nuanced details of standard-essential patents, but arrived at a common sense result: either the patents at issue...more
8/24/2015
/ Contributory Infringement ,
End-Users ,
Indirect Infringement ,
Induced Infringement ,
Licensees ,
Patent Exhaustion ,
Patent Infringement ,
Patent Litigation ,
Patents ,
Software ,
Standard Essential Patents ,
Summary Judgment
In This Issue:
- After B&B Hardware, What is the Full Scope of Estoppel Arising From a PTAB Decision in District Court Litigation?
- When You Don’t Know What You Know: The Role of Unappreciated Inherency in the...more
6/3/2015
/ America Invents Act ,
B&B Hardware v Hargis Industries ,
CLS Bank v Alice Corp ,
Copyright ,
Copyright Infringement ,
Covered Business Method Patents ,
Estoppel ,
Intellectual Property Litigation ,
Obviousness ,
Patent Infringement ,
Patent Litigation ,
Patent Trial and Appeal Board ,
Patents ,
Software ,
Trademark Litigation ,
Trademark Trial and Appeal Board ,
Trademarks ,
USPTO
Patents generally describe new inventions in terms of a unique structure, function, or combination of structure and function. Those patents that focus on functions of computers or computer-implemented functionality are often...more
6/2/2015
/ America Invents Act ,
CLS Bank v Alice Corp ,
Covered Business Method Patents ,
Mayo v. Prometheus ,
Patent Litigation ,
Patent-Eligible Subject Matter ,
Patents ,
Popular ,
Section 101 ,
Software ,
Software Developers
In This Issue:
- Prior Art Redefined Under the AIA
- PTAB Holds a Firm Line on Additional Discovery
- The Art of Prior Art Searching
- Anticipating a Federal Trade Secret Law
- Trademark...more
11/26/2014
/ Additional Discovery ,
America Invents Act ,
Covered Business Method Proceedings ,
Inter Partes Review (IPR) Proceeding ,
Patent Trial and Appeal Board ,
Patentability Search ,
Patents ,
Prior Art ,
SCOTUS ,
Trade Secrets ,
USPTO
Prior to filing a patent application at the United States Patent and Trademark Office (“USPTO”), an applicant seeking patent protection for an invention should consider conducting a prior art search. Also known as a...more