Understanding the Impact of IPR Estoppel and PTAB Discretionary Denials — Patents: Post-Grant Podcast
New Developments in Obviousness-Type Double Patenting and Original Patent Requirements — Patents: Post-Grant Podcast
Inter Partes Review: Validity Before the PTAB
EcoFactor, Inc. v. Google LLC, No. 2023-1101 (Fed. Cir. (W.D. Tex.) May 23, 2025). En banc opinion by Moore, joined by Lourie, Dyk, Prost, Taranto, Chen, Hughes, and Stoll. Opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part by...more
SAGE PRODUCTS, LLC v. STEWART [OPINION] - Before Reyna, Cunningham, and Stark. Appeal from the United States Patent and Trademark Office, Patent Trial and Appeal Board. The Board did not abuse its discretion by relying on...more
Addressing the issues of claim construction and the requisite expert qualifications to testify on obviousness and anticipation, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit vacated a Patent Trial & Appeal Board decision...more
2024 brought exciting developments at the Federal Circuit. The court issued its first en banc decision in a patent case in five years in LKQ, which significantly altered the standard for proving obviousness of a design...more
Abuse of Process and/or Sanctions – 37 C.F.R. § 42.12 - Spectrum Solutions LLC v. Longhorn Vaccines & Diagnostics, LLC, IPR2021-00847, IPR2021-00850, IPR2021-00854, IPR2021-00857 & IPR2021-00860 - Decision...more
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reversed a Patent Trial & Appeal Board obviousness decision, finding that disclosure in the prior art of all recited claim elements across multiple references, without more,...more
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit upheld a district court’s claim construction and jury instructions but reversed a premature judgment as a matter of law (JMOL) on obviousness and an imprecise damages award....more
Cyntec Company, Ltd. v. Chilisin Electronics Corp., Appeal No. 2022-1873 (Fed. Cir. Oct. 16, 2023) In this week’s Case of the Week, the Federal Circuit reversed and remanded a California district court’s judgment as a...more
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed a district court decision finding that two patents covering enantiomerically pure compositions of the psoriasis drug Otezla® (apremilast) were valid and one patent...more
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed a Patent Trial & Appeal Board (Board) obviousness decision after finding that the patent owner failed to explain how its cited extrinsic evidence supported its proposed...more
In a recent opinion by the Federal Circuit, Auris Health, Inc. v Intuitive Surgical Operations, Inc., Case 2021-1732, the panel split on the weight of general industry skepticism in an obviousness analysis and split on...more
The PTAB Strategies and Insights newsletter provides timely updates and insights into how best to handle proceedings at the USPTO. It is designed to increase return on investment for all stakeholders looking at the entire...more
INTEL CORPORATION v. QUALCOMM INCORPORATED - Before Prost, Taranto, and Hughes. Appeal from the Patent Trial and Appeal Board. Summary: A “generic” motivation to combine that has broad appeal or applicability is not...more
As we demonstrated in our own successful appeal, Arendi S.A.R.L. v. Apple Inc. (Fed. Cir. 2016), a petition for inter partes review (“IPR”) may fail when an expert declaration lacks detailed explanation. An expert’s...more
HVLPO2, LLC v. OXYGEN FROG, LLC - Before Newman, Moore, and Chen. Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Florida. Summary: It is an abuse of discretion to permit a witness to testify...more
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit determined that a Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) finding regarding motivation to combine based only on conclusory expert testimony was not supported by substantial...more
In a recent precedential decision, TQ Delta, LLC v. Cisco Systems, Inc., the Federal Circuit reversed a pair of USPTO inter partes review proceedings that invalidated all claims of two related U.S. patents because “the...more
Invoking a newly minted equivalent disclosure doctrine, a panel of the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit found that the written description requirement of § 112 was satisfied in the interest of arriving at a...more
In 2016, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit docketed more appeals from the US Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) than any other venue—a first in its over 30-year history. The post grant proceedings created by the...more
The Federal Circuit affirmed the Patent Trial and Appeal Board’s inter partes review decision declaring various claims of patent owner Thales’ U.S. Patent No. 6,474,159 (“the ‘159 patent”) nonobvious. In doing so, the Federal...more
An expert asserting that a patent claim reciting different features than the prior art is nonetheless “equivalent” to the prior art must address and account for the recited limitations head-on, or otherwise lose persuasive...more
Berkheimer v. HP Inc., Appeal No. 2017-1437 (Fed. Cir. Feb. 8, 2018) - In Berkheimer v. HP Inc., the Federal Circuit reviewed the District Court’s summary judgment finding that certain claims of a patent were invalid as...more
On October 17, 2017, the PTAB issued a final written decision in an IPR holding all claims unpatentable after the Federal Circuit vacated and remanded the PTAB’s previous final written decision. The PTAB reversed their...more
The Federal Circuit held that the PTAB may consider legal conclusions of obviousness by experts, but the expert papers must make adequate factual findings and provide a satisfactory explanation as to determinations of...more
A recent decision by the Federal Circuit suggests that relying on “common sense” in analyzing whether a patent is obvious in view of prior art cannot always be based on common sense alone. In a decision providing...more