The Court had a busy week as the weather begins to turn, and those with school-aged kids begin to plan for spring break. This week we look at the Court’s latest reminder that obviousness is a flexible analysis, so below we...more
Now that the Court is open to the public—not just for arguing counsel but for anyone to watch arguments and visit the Court—I thought it was time to take a look at argument timing again....more
The Supreme Court term has started, and the Court once again seems to be dipping its toes in the water with more CVSGs in 101 cases. Maybe this time the Court will take the plunge. For our case of the week—our highly...more
Those that regularly practice before the Court know about Rule 36s. We’ve written about them before. It’s a one-line per curiam decision that generally comes a few days after oral argument...more
We’re now in the waning days of summer, and the Court’s activity last week somewhat reflected that: two decisions and a few orders. One of those orders was for something you don’t see often: an appeal being dismissed for an...more
For most of us, we’re stuck in the August heat, on delayed European vacations, or hopefully just hanging out at the beach. But for the Court it still was work as usual, including a return trip to the Federal Circuit for the...more
Precedential opinions: 3
Non-precedential opinions: 4
Rule 36: 1
Longest pending case from argument: Lanclos v. United States, No. 21-1750 (219 days)...
...more
As we’ve written about multiple times, a petition for certiorari from the Federal Circuit’s starkly divided decision in American Axle has been pending at the Supreme Court for some time. Many thought this would be the case...more
The Supreme Court dominated the news last week, and the Federal Circuit issued just four opinions. One of them was a doozy: to reinforce confidence in the judicial process, the Court vacated a $2 billion judgment that...more
We’ve been updating our stats pretty frequently but haven’t had a recent post about what—if anything—has changed in affirmance rates as more data has been compiled. So with basically 2½ years of data, I thought we could look...more
Now that we have the Supreme Court’s big decision in Arthrex, which we wrote about here, many of us are wondering what the next steps will look like. We may know sooner rather than later. Today, the Federal Circuit issued a...more
The Supreme Court issued its long-awaited decision Monday in United States v. Arthrex, Inc., Nos. 19-1434, -1452, -1458. Although a majority of the Court held that Congress’s statutory scheme violated the Constitution, the...more
6/22/2021
/ Administrative Patent Judges ,
Appointments Clause ,
Arthrex Inc v Smith & Nephew Inc ,
Executive Branch ,
Executive Powers ,
Inter Partes Review (IPR) Proceeding ,
Patent Trial and Appeal Board ,
Patents ,
SCOTUS ,
United States v Arthrex Inc ,
USPTO
Some of the big news a couple weeks ago was the Supreme Court’s decision to invite the Solicitor General (SG) to file a brief expressing the views of the United States in American Axle, a Section 101 case involving an...more
Last week was Court week, so it was busy in the Federal Circuit with telephonic oral arguments. Despite all the activity, the Court still issued a dozen opinions, including two precedential ones. For our case of the week, we...more
It has been a little while since we took a look at what—from a statistics standpoint—went down at recent oral arguments. Since the Federal Circuit went remote, there was an initial wave of a high percentage of appeals that...more
There’s a perception in the Federal Circuit bar that that Court has been scheduling cases for oral argument a bit quicker recently. Now, on some levels, it’s all relative—the Federal Circuit has always been pretty quick in...more
Originating tribunal: Patent Trial and Appeal Board -
Date: March 12, 2021 -
Panel: Judges Newman, Moore, and Stoll, with Judge Moore writing the precedential order -
Result: Appeal dismissed, and mandamus...more
3/16/2021
/ All Writs Act ,
Denial of Institution ,
Due Process ,
Inter Partes Review (IPR) Proceeding ,
Janssen Pharmaceuticals ,
Jurisdiction ,
Mandamus Petitions ,
Mylan Pharmaceuticals ,
Patent Litigation ,
Patent Trial and Appeal Board ,
Patents ,
Precedential Opinion
All eyes are on Arthrex this week, right? So of course we decided to take a look at a Board decision, and one that—so says the dissent—creates a circuit split. Below we provide our usual weekly statistics and our case of...more
Last week I took a look at affirmance rates—both in general and excluding Rule 36s (see It’s Two Weeks After Your Argument, And You’ve Heard Nothing. What Does That Mean). This week I decided to see what things have been...more
Since we started this blog, we have taken a look at win-loss percentages a number of times. Now that we recently updated our statistics, we took another look. This time we thought we’d add a twist to our calculations by...more
Out with the old, and in with the new: it’s Court week for the short February month, so we thought we’d revisit what happened at oral arguments last month and what’s happening now....more
As many readers know, the Supreme Court just granted a petition for certiorari in Minerva Surgical, Inc. v. Hologic, Inc. The case asks the Supreme Court to abolish the doctrine of assignor estoppel. But the Supreme Court...more
Now that the new year has started, we’re seeing an uptick in precedential opinions. This week we decided to turn back to patent appeals, taking a look at IPRs and Article III—always a fun topic. Below we provide our usual...more
1/11/2021
/ Appeals ,
Article III ,
Burden-Shifting ,
Inter Partes Review (IPR) Proceeding ,
Mootness ,
Patent Infringement ,
Patent Trial and Appeal Board ,
Patents ,
Precedential Opinion ,
Rule 36 ,
Standing ,
Vacatur
Last week, we got what may be the last big batch of Federal Circuit opinions of 2020. (In 2019, only six more opinions issued between this time and the end of the year.) Although most of last week’s decisions were issued...more
We updated our stats, so we now have over a year of data since we started collecting data from every Federal Circuit decision. As such, we thought we might take a look at some of the timing data on Federal Circuit appeals. ...more