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
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
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
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
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
Last week, Seth Lloyd and I noticed that there had been two more Rule 36s in appeals without oral argument from the Federal Circuit’s November sitting. And then yesterday, Bloomberg’s Perry Cooper tweeted that two more...more
Thanksgiving has come and gone, and we’ve all hopefully had a chance to ponder what we’re thankful for (including that a wild 2020 is about to close). Next week marks the start of the Federal Circuit’s last oral argument...more
It’s a few days before Thanksgiving and the sunsets are shorter and earlier, so we thought we’d discuss a CBM before the sun completely sets on that procedure. Below we provide our usual weekly statistics and our case of the...more
At Federal Circuitry, we frequently update our statistics. We now have almost a year’s worth of data since we started our project of collecting every Federal Circuit decision and collating all of the Court’s substantive...more
Over the past several months, we’ve looked at what Federal Circuit cases the Supreme Court has and hasn’t reviewed, and how often the Supreme Court agrees with each Federal Circuit judge. Today, we got another data point with...more
The Federal Circuit had a fairly busy week as summer officially came to a close. It issued six written decisions last week, three precedential. Below we provide our usual weekly statistics and our case of the week—our...more
Maybe it was the end of summer and the start of fall, or the kids (kind of) going back to school. But whatever it was, last week the Court issued only one precedential decision, in a veteran’s benefits case. All said, the...more
9/17/2020
/ Administrative Patent Judges ,
Appeals ,
Appellate Courts ,
Appointments Clause ,
Arthrex Inc v Smith & Nephew Inc ,
Constitutional Challenges ,
Director of the USPTO ,
Follow-On Patent Petitions ,
Inter Partes Review (IPR) Proceeding ,
Patent Trial and Appeal Board ,
Reaffirmation ,
Remand ,
SCOTUS ,
Severability Doctrine ,
Vacated
Last week was September Court week, marking the unofficial end of summer for Federal Circuit practitioners. The Court issued a total of 25 decisions, including 8 Rule 36 summary affirmances in cases argued last week, as well...more
9/9/2020
/ § 314(d) ,
§ 315(b) ,
§314(a) ,
§314(b) ,
America Invents Act ,
Appeals ,
Blackberry ,
Dissenting Opinions ,
Facebook ,
Google ,
Inter Partes Review (IPR) Proceeding ,
Joinder ,
Judicial Review ,
Non-Appealable Decisions ,
Patent Infringement ,
Patent Litigation ,
Patent Trial and Appeal Board ,
Patents ,
SCOTUS ,
Thryv Inc v Click-To-Call Technologies LP ,
Time-Barred Claims ,
Vacated
Next week is Court week. Readers may remember that, after the Court released the September calendar, we predicted that the submission trend would continue. Were we right? Sort of....more
8/29/2020
/ Appeals ,
Appellate Courts ,
Appellate Practice Guidance ,
Court Closures ,
Court Schedules ,
Dissenting Opinions ,
Oral Argument ,
Patent Trial and Appeal Board ,
Patent Validity ,
Patents ,
Reaffirmation ,
Remand ,
Vacated
Last week, the Court did not have many precedential decisions as Washington, D.C., COVID-19 or not, was in its usual August slowdown. Unlike the previous two weeks where we touched upon non-patent issues, we return (kind of,...more
8/25/2020
/ Administrative Procedure Act ,
Adverse Action ,
America Invents Act ,
Appellate Courts ,
Constitutional Challenges ,
Exclusive Jurisdiction ,
Final Written Decisions ,
Inter Partes Review (IPR) Proceeding ,
Judicial Review ,
Litigation Strategies ,
Patent Ownership ,
Patent Trial and Appeal Board ,
Precedential Opinion ,
Reaffirmation ,
Set-Asides