The Federal Circuit has issued a nonprecedential decision in Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, CF Dynamic Advances LLC v. Amazon.com, Inc., relating to U.S. Patent No. 7,177,798 (the “798 patent”) to Rensselaer Polytechnic...more
Less than a year after holding that generic machine-learning patents are abstract in Recentive Analytics, Inc. v. Fox Corp., the Federal Circuit may be refining where to draw the line on patent eligibility....more
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed a district court’s dismissal of a patent infringement suit, holding that the asserted web conferencing claims were directed to an abstract idea, lacked any inventive...more
On January 22, 2026, the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed the Rule 12 dismissal of a patent infringement action brought by US Patent No. 7,679,637 LLC against Google LLC, holding that the...more
Section 101 eligibility remains one of the most unpredictable and frequently contested areas of U.S. patent practice, particularly for software, artificial intelligence, and machine learning....more
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed a district court judgment holding asserted claims of U.S. Patent No. 8,139,652 ineligible under 35 U.S.C. § 101 in Technology in Ariscale, LLC v. Razer USA Ltd.,...more
What’s New: USPTO Embraces Evidence-Driven § 101 Practice - The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) recently issued two coordinated memoranda explaining how applicants can use Subject Matter Eligibility Declarations...more
Patent eligibility under 35 U.S.C. § 101 should be a straightforward threshold question: any “new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter” is eligible for protection. Yet over time, this once-clear...more
The state of patent eligibility appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 101 before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is defined by a singular, overwhelming finding — abysmally low...more
In a rare procedural move, the United States Patent and Trademark Office’s (USPTO) director-convened Appeals Review Panel (ARP) recently vacated a § 101 rejection that had been introduced by the Patent Trial and Appeal Board...more
Just a few days into his tenure as director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, John A. Squires has sent a message to the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) to tone down its aggressive use of § 101. This message comes...more
Patent applications for artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning, and other software-related inventions are often rejected by the US Patent and Trademark Office (Patent Office) as being too abstract and thus ineligible...more
The August 4, 2025 memorandum (Memo) issued by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) clarifies how examiners should approach subject matter eligibility under 35 U.S.C. § 101. Importantly, the Memo provides critical...more
On August 11, in Powerblock Holdings, Inc. v iFit, Inc., the Federal Circuit offered at least two observations that can benefit patentees seeking patent protection for inventions involving software. First, the court noted...more
On August 4, 2025, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) released a new memorandum to patent examiners in Technology Centers 2100, 2600, and 3600, providing targeted reminders on evaluating subject matter eligibility...more
On July 21, 2025, District Judge Paul A. Engelmayer (S.D.N.Y.) granted Defendants Teads, Inc., Teads SA, and Teads SARL’s (together, “Teads”) Motion to Dismiss Yieldmo, Inc.’s (“Yieldmo”) Amended Complaint alleging that Teads...more
Sterne Kessler’s U.S. IP Update is a newsletter delivering the latest developments in U.S. intellectual property law, tailored for companies and legal counsel in Korea. Stay informed on key court decisions, policy changes,...more
On April 18, 2025, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) ruled in Recentive Analytics Inc. v. Fox Corp. et al. that new uses for established machine learning do not make the claims patent-eligible....more
On September 9, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reversed a finding by the District Court for the Northern District of California that point-of-view camera claims were ineligible. ...more
In the recent decision of Miller Mendel, Inc. v. City of Anna, Texas, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 17637 (Fed. Cir. July 18, 2024), the Federal Circuit upheld the district court’s grant of a motion for judgment on the pleadings under...more
Over the last two years, we have studied the examiner affirmance rates of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) for § 101 rejections. The PTAB is the administrative court of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO)...more
On July 17, 2024, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) published guidance regarding the patent subject matter eligibility of claims concerning technology applicable to artificial intelligence (AI)....more
In a July 16 press release, The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) announced that it issued a guidance update on “patent subject matter eligibility to address innovation in critical emerging technologies including...more
People.ai, Inc. v. Clari Inc., 2022-1364, (Fed. Cir. April. 7, 2023) - In an appeal before the Federal Circuit, plaintiff People.ai argued to no avail that the Northern District of California erred in its finding of...more
Once again addressing the application of Alice, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit partially reversed a district court’s dismissal of several patents as subject matter ineligible for error in analyzing their...more