New Developments in Obviousness-Type Double Patenting and Original Patent Requirements — Patents: Post-Grant Podcast
Inter Partes Review: Validity Before the PTAB
Specify the Steps of Information Manipulation or Lose under § 101 - In Mobile Acuity Ltd. v. Blippar Ltd. Appeal No. 22-2216, the Federal Circuit held that patent claims that merely recite result-orientated, functional...more
The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has issued a Memorandum to the Corps of Patent Examiners (the “Guidance”), attempting to provide clarity in the wake of the Federal Circuit’s highly anticipated en banc...more
There have been only a few precedential decisions from the Federal Circuit related to obviousness since spring sprung. While these decisions have produced mixed results for the lower courts, clinical study protocols have held...more
Antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) is a promising class of cancer treatments with accelerating U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval and rapidly growing market size as discussed in previous articles in this series. This...more
Two weeks ago we discussed Vanda Pharmaceuticals’ ambitious cert petition asking the Supreme Court to discontinue the “reasonable expectation of success” standard for patent obviousness that for decades has been a mainstay of...more
An en banc panel of the Federal Circuit recently heard arguments in a case that could change how courts assess design patents for “obviousness.” LKQ Corporation and GM Global Technology Operations LLC are engaged in a...more
2023 saw a return to business as usual for the Federal Circuit. Oral arguments are once again in-person and open to the public, and the Court has resumed its former practice of holding occasional sittings outside of...more
Baxalta Inc. v. Genentech, Inc., Appeal No. 22-1461 (Fed. Cir. Sept. 20, 2023) Our Case of the Week focuses on the enablement requirement. It’s the first case to come before the Federal Circuit following the Supreme...more
In a surprising move, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (“CAFC”) has granted a petition for rehearing en banc on the issue of whether the test for determining obviousness of design patents has been overruled by the...more
[co-author: Jamie Dohopolski] Last year, the continued global COVID-19 pandemic forced American courts to largely continue the procedures set in place in 2020. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit was no...more
For more than a decade, this blog has covered the topic of patentable subject matter. Over the years, we’ve addressed various issues regarding business methods, abstract ideas and other various topics. The “laws of nature”...more
The year 2020 brought significant change to many sectors of life, and patent law was no exception. Throughout the year, the U.S. Supreme Court and the Federal Circuit handed down several notable decisions that have and will...more
In the first half of 2020, several notable decisions further shaped the course of patent law, with rulings from the Supreme Court and Federal Circuit impacting PTAB proceedings, as described below...more
It is difficult to think of a case that has had more influence on patent practice than KSR v. Teleflex (550 U.S. 398 (2007)). In KSR, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the established practice that an invention could not be...more
Following the Supreme Court’s decision in SAS v. Iancu, which held that an IPR institution is an “all-or-nothing” proposition, the PTAB lost its ability to rely on “partial institutions” as a case management tool (e.g., by...more
On April 17, 2019, Senators Tillis (R-NC) and Coons (D-DE), along with a bipartisan group of three members of the House of Representatives, announced the release of a framework on Section 101 patent reform. Senators Tillis...more
After reflecting upon the events of the past twelve months, Patent Docs presents its 12th annual list of top patent stories. For 2018, we identified fifteen stories that were covered on Patent Docs last year that we believe...more
In recent years, the U.S. Supreme Court has considered a number of intellectual property and related cases, but many issues remain unresolved. Therefore, it is important to look both at the cases currently before the U.S....more
Supreme Court Upholds Constitutionality of IPRs, Requires PTAB to Decide Validity of All Challenged Claims - Oil States Energy Services v. Greene’s Energy Group & SAS Institute v. Iancu (24 April 2018)....more
The PTAB’s practice of partially instituting IPRs has been in the news lately, with Jones Day recently arguing against that practice at the Supreme Court on behalf of the SAS Institute (“SAS”). On December 5, 2017, the week...more
The Supreme Court most recently revisited the proper standards for making an obviousness determination ten years ago, in KSR Int'l. Co. v. Teleflex. Inc. While in some ways changing the obviousness standard, for example...more
Arbitration - Waymo v. Uber Technologies, 870 F.3d 1342 (Fed. Cir. 2017) - Waymo sued Uber and others for trade secret misappropriation and patent infringement. Uber contends that Waymo should be compelled to...more
District Court Abused Discretion in Not Finding Case Exceptional - In Rothschild Connected Devices v. Guardian Protection Services, Appeal No. 2016-2521, the Federal Circuit held that a district court abused its discretion...more
An Obviousness Rejection in Patent-Eligibility Clothing? - In Mayo v. Prometheus, the Supreme Court wrote "[w]e recognize that, in evaluating the significance of additional steps, the § 101 patent-eligibility inquiry and,...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