PATENT CASE OF THE WEEK - Uniloc 2017 LLC v. Hulu, LLC, Appeal No. 2019-1686 (Fed. Cir. July 22, 2020) - In this appeal, the Federal Circuit held for the first time that in inter partes review (“IPR”) proceedings, when...more
Under constitutional principles of United States law, states generally enjoy sovereign immunity. This immunity, enshrined in the 11th amendment of the US Constitution, bars private parties from bringing lawsuits against the...more
In Regents of the Univ. of Minn. v. LSI Corporation, Fed. Cir., No. 18-01559, the Federal Circuit extended the inability to stand behind 11th Amendment Sovereign Immunity to patents owned by individual states, such that they...more
Sovereign Immunity - Sovereign immunity exempts a sovereign from the jurisdiction of a court - States are entitled to sovereign immunity under the 11th amendment Seminole Tribe of Fla v. Florida, 517 U.S. 44 (1996) ...more
In an extensive, 42-page per curiam opinion, the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) surprised no one last Friday by denying the St. Regis Mohawk Tribe's motion to terminate several inter partes review proceedings based on...more
In a rare order by an expanded panel that included the chief, deputy chief and vice chief judges, the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) denied the patent owner’s motions to dismiss based on sovereign immunity under the...more
On December 19, 2017, a seven-judge expanded PTAB panel ruled that the University of Minnesota (UM) waived its Eleventh Amendment immunity defense when it filed a patent infringement action in federal district court. ...more
The PTAB (Patent Trial and Appeal Board) of the USPTO recently issued a decision that a filing of a patent infringement action by a public university waives sovereign immunity to inter partes review (IPR) proceedings in the...more
Patent Trial and Appeal Board Chief Judge David Ruschke recently dealt sovereign immunity a crippling blow. Although Judge Ruschke confirmed that Eleventh Amendment immunity does apply to sovereign actors, he held that when a...more
In a pair of near identical decisions issued on December 19, 2017, an expanded PTAB panel found that the Regents of the University of Minnesota had waived its defense of sovereign immunity by filing actions against the...more
On December 19, 2017, an expanded panel of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) ruled that the state of Minnesota waived its Eleventh Amendment immunity to challenges to patent validity by inter partes review (IPR) by...more
In a case of first impression, an expanded PTAB panel (including Chief APJ Ruschke) found that a parallel enforcement action by a patent owner waives its sovereign immunity defense against under the 11th Amendment an AIA...more
Board Curtails Use of Sovereign Immunity Defense to Avoid IPR - In Ericsson, Inc. v. Regents of the University of Minnesota, an expanded panel denied Patent Owner Regents of the University of Minnesota’s motions to dismiss...more
Yesterday, in Ericsson Inc. v. Regents of the University of Minnesota, an expanded 7-judge PTAB panel ruled that a patent owner waives a claim to sovereign immunity in an IPR “by filing an action in federal court alleging...more
The Patent Trial and Appeal Board was seemingly sufficiently vexed over the question of whether the St. Mohawk Indian Tribe was entitled to have the Board dismiss, on grounds of sovereign immunity, inter partes reviews on...more
Late this summer, Allergan entered into an agreement with the St. Regis Mohawk Nation to assign its rights in several Orange Book-listed patents involved in inter partes review proceedings, with the aim of having those...more
Sovereign immunity refers to the doctrine that the government cannot be sued without its consent. Specifically, the 11th Amendment precludes federal courts from exercising jurisdiction over states in suits brought by private...more
In a creative move to take advantage of recent PTAB decisions regarding Sovereign Immunity, (see e.g., Covidien LP v. University of Florida Research Foundation, IPR2016-01274 and Neochord, Inc. v. University of Maryland,...more
The 11th amendment to the Constitution reads: The judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by citizens of...more
As we have previously reported, sovereign immunity of state universities (who are instruments of state government) has been used to avoid IPRs under the immunity clause of the US Constitution (“Sovereign Immunity of State...more
Addressing for the first time the issue of whether an inter partes review (IPR) may proceed where one of the co-owners was entitled to sovereign immunity under the 11th Amendment, the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) held...more
The PTAB has again addressed sovereign immunity in the context of an IPR. Reactive Surfaces, LTD. petitioned for IPR of U.S. Patents No. 8,394,618 and 8,252,571. The ’618 and ’571 patents are co-owned by Toyota Motor...more
In separate non-precedential decisions issued by three different panels, the PTAB has permitted state university patent owners to invoke the Eleventh Amendment in Inter Partes Review proceedings. Each panel found that IPR...more
Less than four months after its decision in Covidien LP v. University of Florida Research Foundation Incorporated, finding that Eleventh Amendment sovereign immunity applies to PTAB proceedings, the Board has again dismissed...more
On May 23, 2017, the PTAB granted the University of Maryland’s (UM) motion to terminate inter partes review based on UM’s sovereign immunity in Neochord, Inc. v. Univ. of Maryland, Baltimore and Harpoon Medical, Inc.,...more