Talking PTAB with Bob Steinberg
Indefiniteness Before the PTAB
NEW VISION GAMING & DEVELOPMENT, INC. V. SG GAMING, INC. Before Newman, Moore, and Taranto. Appeal from the Patent Trial and Appeal Board. Summary: The Federal Circuit vacated and remanded two CBM decisions under...more
Trimble Inc. v. PerDiemCo LLC, Appeal No. 2019-2164 (Fed. Cir. May 12, 2021) - In this week’s Case of the Week, the Federal Circuit revisited its decision in Red Wing Shoe Co. v. Hockerson-Halberstadt, Inc., 148 F.3d 1355...more
In cxLoyalty Inc. v. Maritz Holdings Inc., 986 F.3d 1367, 1380 (Fed. Cir. 2021), Patent No. 7,134,087 explained that loyalty programs often issue points to customers as a reward for certain activities and allow the customers...more
These charts and graphs appear in the firm's Federal Circuit Appeals from the PTAB and ITC: Summaries of Key 2020 Decisions report... Appeals from the USPTO dipped in FY20, reaching their lowest level since FY15. After four...more
In a precedential decision, the Federal Circuit held that the threshold determination that appellant SIPCO LLC’s patent qualifies for covered business method (CBM) review is non-appealable. Accordingly, the Federal Circuit...more
Appellants in New Vision Gaming & Development v. SC Gaming, Inc. f/k/a Bally Gaming, Inc. and Mobility Workx, LLC v. Unified Patents, LLC challenge the constitutionality of the administrative patent judge (APJ) incentive...more
Less than two years ago, in Return Mail, Inc. v. U.S. Postal Service, 139 S. Ct. 1853 (2018), the Supreme Court held that a government entity -- in that case, the U.S. Postal Service -- is not a "person" under the America...more
State Sovereignty Principles Do Not Allow a State to Bring a Patent Infringement Suit in an Improper Venue - In Board of Regents v. Boston Scientific Corp., Appeal No. 2018-1700, the Federal Circuit ruled that the patent...more
SIPCO, LLC v. EMERSON ELECTRIC CO. Before O’Malley, Reyna, and Chen. Appeal from the Patent Trial and Appeal Board. Reyna concurring-in-part and dissenting-in-part Summary: The language “unobvious over the prior art” in...more
Reasonably Continuous Diligence Is Not Negated If an Inventor Works On Improvements or Evaluates Alternatives to the Claimed Invention - In ATI Technologies ULC v. IANCU, Appeal Nos. 2016-2222, -2406, -2608, the Federal...more
On October 11, 2018, the USPTO published a Final Rule in the Federal Register, adopting a new standard for interpreting claims in trial proceedings before the patent trial and appeal board (PTAB)....more
The USPTO has published a final rule, changing the claim construction standard applied during post-grant proceedings (inter partes reviews, post-grant reviews, and covered business methods reviews) before the Office’s Patent...more
The Federal Circuit decision in In re Durance is a rare precedential decision in an ex parte appeal from a Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) decision rejecting a pending patent application. The Court took the USPTO to task...more
On May 14, 2018, the Supreme Court granted WilmerHale client PNC Bank National Association's (PNC Bank) petition for writ of certiorari and vacated a decision of the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit restricting the...more
On November 16, 2017, the USPTO issued new procedures (“Standard Operating Procedure 9”) for governing cases remanded from the Federal Circuit. These procedures are applicable to all decisions remanded from the Federal...more
The Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) gets most of its attention (judicial and otherwise) regarding its decisions in inter partes review and covered business method proceedings. But the Board also has responsibility for...more
In a precedential opinion, the Federal Circuit affirmed the determination by the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (“PTAB”) in a covered business method review proceeding that the claims of U.S. Patent No. 6,950,807 for providing...more
In a move that could drastically change the patent law landscape, the United States Supreme Court recently granted certiorari in Oil States Energy Services LLC v. Greene’s Energy Group LLC, No. 16-712, to answer the question...more
The Supreme Court has granted a writ of certiorari challenging the constitutionality of inter partes review proceedings conducted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office under the America Invents Act. The Court’s...more
The Supreme Court granted a petition for writ of certiorari to address whether inter partes review – an adversarial process used by the Patent Office to determine the validity of existing patents – is unconstitutional in Oil...more
This paper is based on reports on precedential patent cases decided by the Federal Circuit distributed by Peter Heuser on a weekly basis. ...more
In a series of cases addressing the standard for initiating a covered business method (CBM) review, both the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit and the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) reached the same...more
Federal Circuit Remands IPR Final Decision For Inadequate Obviousness Analysis, Sidesteps Issue of Proper Claim Construction Standard - In Personal Web Technologies, LLC v. Apple, Inc., Appeal No. 2016-1174, the Federal...more
The Federal Circuit recently clarified what patents are subject to the Transitional Program for Covered Business Method Patents, or CBM review, in Secure Axcess, LLC v. PNC Bank National Association. In clarifying what...more
The Federal Circuit has further clarified the scope of the covered business method (CBM) review program under the America Invents Act (AIA), explaining in Secure Axcess, LLC. v. PNC Bank National Association that in order for...more