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Stages of Patent Invalidation Proceedings
On July 29, 2025, Chief Administrative Patent Judge Scott R. Boalick circulated a memorandum to Members of the PTAB entitled “Final Written Decision Procedures for AIA Trial Proceedings.” ...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
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
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
Acting Director of the USPTO Coke Morgan Stewart recently discretionarily denied institution of an inter partes review (IPR) based on a new consideration, “settled expectations,” that is, the length of time that the...more
A Delegated Rehearing Panel (“DRP”) recently modified the PTAB’s construction of the claim term “workload” and remanded, giving Mercedes-Benz USA, LLC (“Petitioner”) another opportunity to challenge a processor patent....more
Apple Inc., et. al v. Gesture Technology Partners, LLC (March 4, 2025) (Moore (Chief Judge), Prost and Stoll) (on appeal from the Patent Trial and Appeal Board) [WAIVER; OBVIOUSNESS] ....more
On April 16, 2025, the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) denied institution of inter partes review (IPR) for several claims of U.S. Patent No. 7,187,307, owned by Universal Connectivity Technologies, Inc. HP Inc., Dell...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
We are excited to present the second edition of Sheppard Mullin’s “Year in Review” report, which provides a comprehensive summary of the key precedential Federal Circuit decisions related to patent law in 2024. Building on...more
AliveCor, Inc. v. Apple, Inc., No. 23-1512 (Fed. Cir. 2025) – On March 7, 2025, the Federal Circuit affirmed the Patent Trial and Appeal Board’s inter partes review (“IPR”) decisions invalidating all claims of three AliveCor...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
Apple Inc., et al. v. Gesture Technology Partners, LLC, Nos. 2023-1475, -1533 (Fed. Cir. (PTAB) Mar. 4, 2025). Opinion by Prost, joined by Moore and Stoll....more
Two recent UPC decisions have provided some guidance on the admissibility and reasonableness of auxiliary requests in revocation actions. The court will look at the specific circumstances and complexity of the revocation...more
The Federal Circuit rejected a recent argument that the PTAB does not have inter partes review (IPR) jurisdiction over expired patents. Because even expired patents involve the grant of public rights, the court explained that...more
On February 10, 2025, the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit issued a decision in Kroy IP Holdings, LLC v. Groupon, Inc., reversing and remanding a district court ruling that had dismissed Kroy’s patent...more
In Honeywell International Inc. v. 3G Licensing, S.A., Appeal No. 23-1354, the Federal Circuit held that under the obviousness standard of 35 U.S.C. § 103, the motivation to modify prior art does not need to be the same as...more
Alexion Pharmaceuticals v Amgen (UPC_Coa-405/2024) and Alexion Pharmaceuticals v Samsung Bioepis NL BV (UPC_CoA-402/2024); December 20, 2024. The UPC Court of Appeal has confirmed a strict approach to correcting erroneous...more
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed a Patent Trial & Appeal Board decision finding challenged claims invalid based on a published patent application that, in an inter partes review (IPR) proceeding, was...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
The Patent Trial and Appeal Board (“PTAB”) recently denied institution in an inter partes review (“IPR”) where Petitioner later filed a parallel petition against the same claims of the same patent. Shenzhen Root Tech. Co.,...more
In Lynk Labs, Inc., v. Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., the Federal Circuit reinforced that patent applications may serve as prior art in IPR proceedings as of their filing date—even where those applications were not published...more
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit vacated and remanded a Patent Trial & Appeal Board decision, finding that the Board erred by failing to explain its holding and reasoning regarding a motivation to combine prior...more
In its first precedential opinion of 2025, Honeywell v. 3G Licensing, No. 2023-1354, the Federal Circuit held that a person of ordinary skill in the art (POSA) needs not to have the same motivation as the inventor in an...more
In Allergan USA, Inc. v. MSN Laboratories Private Ltd., No. 2024-1061 (Fed. Cir. August 13, 2024), the Federal Circuit reversed the District Court of Delaware’s invalidity determination of certain claims of U.S. Patent No....more