Understanding the Impact of IPR Estoppel and PTAB Discretionary Denials — Patents: Post-Grant Podcast
Podcast: IP(DC): Inside Patent Reform Efforts, Anticipated Federal Circuit Appeals, and Patent Cases of the Upcoming Supreme Court Term
Is the Patent Litigation Boom Coming to an End?
The Trump administration is considering changing the U.S. patent maintenance fee structure from the existing three fixed flat fees to an annual, value‑based “tax” model where patent holders would pay 1%–5% of the estimated...more
A recent memo from the acting director of the US Patent and Trademark Office directs the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) to reject inter partes review (IPR) petitions that use “applicant admitted prior art (AAPA), expert...more
In Google v. Sonos, the Federal Circuit soundly disposed of arguments that the patent-in-suit was unenforceable due to laches based on an “unreasonable delay” in patent prosecution. Does the court’s reasoning foreclose the...more
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reversed a district court’s decision upholding patent validity, finding that the subject patent’s specification clearly established that the written description failed to...more
In a significant decision for patent law and the fitness equipment industry, a panel of the Federal Circuit reversed a partial dismissal of PowerBlock Holdings, Inc.’s patent infringement claims brought against iFit, Inc. in...more
Mondis Tech. Ltd. v. LG Electronics Inc., Appeal Nos. 2023-2117, -2116 (Fed. Cir. Aug. 8, 2025) Our Case of the Week focuses on the written description requirement, and, in particular, how that requirement is considered...more
The USPTO must reject a patent application if the applicant’s claim covers what the prior art already disclosed, and patent applicants may respond to such rejections with arguments that what they claimed was different. ...more
On July 18, 2025, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reversed a lower court ruling in Colibri Heart Valve LLC v. Medtronic CoreValve, LLC, holding that prosecution history estoppel barred the patentees’ doctrine...more
Patents are a mutually beneficial agreement between inventors and the government. Each side makes concessions in service of their own, and the greater, good. It’s a careful balance, where policy and rules that are too...more
Restem filed a petition for inter partes review of U.S. Patent No. 9,803,176, directed to stem cells obtained from umbilical cord tissue and isolated through a two-step process to create a specific cell marker expression...more
On May 12, 2025, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit vacated-in-part and remanded a Patent Trial and Appeal Board (“PTAB”) decision in an interference proceeding concluding that the Broad Institute, Inc. (“Broad...more
In IOENGINE, LLC v. Ingenico Inc. (Fed. Cir. 2025), the Federal Circuit narrowed the scope of IPR estoppel under 35 U.S.C. § 315(e)(2), which precludes an IPR petitioner from asserting in court that a patent claim “is invalid...more
Those hoping the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit would finally resolve priority in the long-pending dispute between the University of California and the Broad Institute will have to wait a little longer. Oral...more
In a year defined by landmark decisions, impactful announcements and new standards, clarity in the patent world comes as a welcome relief. It arrived via a federal circuit court decision in August 2024 that settled certain...more
The legal landscape quaked, and clients and counsel continue to navigate the tremors. More than 40 years of precedent was upended in May 2024 when a federal circuit court struck down the Rosen-Durling test for assessing...more
Since serving as a Federal Circuit clerk, Michael Hawes has monitored that court's precedential opinions and prepares a deeply outlined index by subject matter (invalidity, infringement, claim construction, etc.) of relevant...more
As we predicted in our 2023 report, 2024 was a banner year for design rights in the U.S. and elsewhere. In last year’s report, we noted that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) agreed to consider en banc...more
Ericsson v. Lenovo, Inc., 2024 WL 4558664 (Fed. Cir. 2024) - On October 24, 2024, the Federal Circuit in Ericsson v. Lenovo vacated a district court’s denial of Lenovo’s request for an antisuit injunction in a case...more
In Platinum Optics Tech. Inc. v. Viavi Sols. Inc., the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) issued a precedential decision on the requirements for standing to appeal from an inter partes review (IPR) final...more
Celanese Int'l Corp. v. Int'l Trade Comm'n, No. 2022-1827, 2024 WL 3747277, at *1 (Fed. Cir. Aug. 12, 2024) - Manufacturers beware! Your sales of products based on secret manufacturing processes may invalidate your...more
A private sale may start an inventor’s one-year filing clock, but it likely won’t save a patentee from an intervening prior art reference. On July 31, 2024, in a precedential decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the...more
On July 26, 2024, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (“CAFC”) issued a precedential opinion reversing-in-part decisions from the U.S. Patent Trial and Appeal Board (“PTAB”) in two inter partes reexamination...more
Upending decades of continuity in the world of design patents, the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (“CAFC”), sitting en banc in LKQ Corporation v. GM Global Technology Operations LLC, overturned the...more
Not surprisingly, 2023 was another notable year for design rights around the globe. However, nowhere more than the U.S. did we see court decisions that will, in the case of one, and could in the case of another, have...more
As we have previously written about, the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (“Federal Circuit”) has granted a petition for an en banc rehearing of LKQ Corp. et al v. GM Global Technology to rule on the...more