The Western District of Texas granted a motion to stay a patent infringement lawsuit pending inter partes review not only because doing so would simplify the issues in the still-early litigation and reduce the burden on the...more
The Federal Circuit dismissed an appeal of a final written decision in an IPR based on issue preclusion where a district court had dismissed a complaint finding the patent claims subject-matter ineligible. The patentee had...more
The Patent Trial and Appeal Board instituted an inter partes review over patent owner’s objections that the petition did not timely identify all real parties-in-interest (RPI) and was filed by a phantom legal entity after...more
7/29/2024
/ California ,
Delaware ,
Inter Partes Review (IPR) Proceeding ,
Jurisdiction ,
Limited Liability Company (LLC) ,
Patent Infringement ,
Patent Litigation ,
Patent Ownership ,
Patent Trial and Appeal Board ,
Patents ,
Reorganizations
The Patent Trial and Appeal Board denied institution of a petition for inter partes review under 35 U.S.C. § 315(b) because the petition was filed more than one year after patent owner had served a complaint for patent...more
The Patent Trial and Appeal Board has denied institution and joinder of an inter partes review petition after determining that the petition was not only time-barred but that joinder was also foreclosed. In making its...more
In advance of a new trial to determine damages for patent infringement, a district court denied plaintiff’s motion to preclude defendants from introducing the terms of plaintiff’s settlement offers. The district court...more
The district court in a patent infringement case granted plaintiff’s ex parte request to strike defendant’s prior use defense under 35 U.S.C. § 273. Because defendant failed to plead the defense and did not raise it until...more
The Patent Trial and Appeal Board held that service of a bare complaint without exhibits did not trigger the one-year time bar under 35 U.S.C. § 315(b), which requires the filing of a petition for inter partes review within...more
Patent Office Director Katherine Vidal recently issued a precedential decision addressing an issue of first impression before the Board: whether the patentability of multiple dependent claims must be determined separately for...more
In the wake of her October 4, 2022 Precedential OpenSky decision, the United States Patent and Trademark Office Director Katherine Vidal issued another precedential decision further clarifying the actions that should be...more
In a precedential 52-page sua sponte decision, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) Director Katherine Vidal addressed several issues of first impression relating to sanctionable misconduct in inter partes...more
Petitioners moved for an order requiring Patent Owner to produce discovery comprising Final Infringement Contentions from related district court litigations between the parties. Petitioners set forth two independent bases...more
In a recent order, the Eastern District of Texas declined to preclude a defendant from raising prior art system references despite patentee’s argument that similar printed publications could have been raised in earlier inter...more
Applying recent Federal Circuit precedent requiring language evincing a present conveyance of patent rights, a district court in the Western District of Pennsylvania found that the contractual language “shall become the...more
A judge in the Northern District of Georgia has granted a defendant’s motion to dismiss a patent infringement case for failure to state a claim under Rule 12(b)(6). The court found that the complaint failed to meet the...more
A judge in the Eastern District of Virginia recently held that cancellation of independent claims in an inter partes review (IPR) did not preclude the plaintiff from asserting infringement based on the doctrine of equivalents...more
Successfully licensing standard-essential patents (SEPs) is key to a company’s ability to manufacture and sell products that practice a standard. With revolutionary advances in technology on the horizon, licensing of SEPs...more
During a Markman hearing, a judge in the Eastern District of North Carolina denied a plaintiff’s request that the defendant be judicially estopped from arguing claim constructions that were different from positions the...more
Inter partes review (IPR) proceedings can give rise to statutory and collateral estoppel. But these two bases for estoppel attach at different times, which can lead to asymmetrical outcomes in related district court...more
A district court has ruled that the exclusive statute for determining venue in patent cases, 28 U.S.C. § 1400(b), did not override the parties prior agreement on where suit could be brought. The court also ruled that transfer...more
In a recent inter partes review (IPR), a patent owner overcame a facially persuasive obviousness challenge by relying on evidence from an earlier litigation to establish objective indicia of nonobviousness.
In RTI...more
A district court has ruled that the statutory estoppel arising from an inter partes review (IPR) proceeding does not apply to anticipation and obviousness defenses that rely significantly on a physical device. The court also...more
The District Court for the Northern District of West Virginia recently found method of treatment claims directed to treating a specific disease at a specific dose invalid for lack of written description based on the context...more
7/6/2020
/ Evidence ,
Hatch-Waxman ,
Patent Infringement ,
Patent Invalidity ,
Patent Litigation ,
Patent Prosecution History ,
Patents ,
Pharmaceutical Industry ,
Pharmaceutical Patents ,
Treatment Method Patents ,
Written Descriptions
Declaratory judgment (“DJ”) actions have fallen out of favor in patent cases in recent years. In 2011, DJ complaints made up approximately 11 percent of all patent cases filed that year. Last year, they made up less than 5...more
An accused infringer in a district court case could not take advantage of a prior claim construction ruling from an inter partes review (IPR) proceeding involving unasserted claims of the same patent. The Patent Trial and...more