Hologic, Inc. v. Minerva Surgical, Inc., Appeal Nos. 2019-2054, -2081 (Fed. Cir. Aug. 11, 2022) - Our Case of the Week follows the Hologic saga as it returns to the Federal Circuit on remand from the Supreme Court’s...more
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 exception. It briefly returned to live...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
As the world marched forward in the face of the lingering covid-19 global pandemic, the Supreme Court and Federal Circuit followed suit, issuing several noteworthy decisions of which patent litigators should be aware in 2022....more
Join the conference that the “who’s who” of Hatch-Waxman litigators have designated as the forum which sets the standards for Paragraph IV practice. ACI’s Paragraph IV Litigation Conference is returning LIVE & IN-PERSON to...more
Bulk-Filed Patent Applications Claiming Distant Priority Trigger Prosecution Laches - In Hyatt v. Hirshfeld, Appeal No. 18-2390, the Federal Circuit held that the PTO met its burden to prove prosecution laches for bulk-filed...more
[co-authors: Patrick Murray, Risa Rahman, and Jae Bandeh] The PTAB Strategies and Insights newsletter provides timely updates and insights into how best to handle proceedings at the USPTO. It is designed to increase return...more
On April 21, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Minerva Surgical, Inc. v. Hologic, Inc., a case involving whether the doctrine of assignor estoppel should be retained, abolished, or limited. In general, assignor...more
Last Friday, the U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari in Minerva Surgical v. Hologic, thereby agreeing to resolve a long-running debate on patent law’s doctrine of assignor estoppel. Minerva Surgical has asked the Court to...more
As many readers know, the Supreme Court just granted a petition for certiorari in Minerva Surgical, Inc. v. Hologic, Inc. The case asks the Supreme Court to abolish the doctrine of assignor estoppel. But the Supreme Court...more
Last spring in Hologic, Inc. v. Minerva Surgical, Inc., the Federal Circuit ruled that the doctrine of assignor estoppel does not prevent an assignor from lodging a validity challenge of either patent in an IPR proceeding. In...more
HOLOGIC, INC. v. MINERVA SURGICAL, INC. Before Wallach, Clevenger, and Stoll. Appeals from the United States District Court District of Delaware. Summary: The doctrine of assignor estoppel precludes an assignor from...more
Assignor estoppel is a long-established, common-law doctrine of equity, which prevents a party who assigns a patent to another from later challenging the validity of the assigned patent. The doctrine also applies to parties...more
The popularity of IPR proceedings will likely increase as assignor estoppel does not apply to IPRs. Inter Partes Review (IPR) proceedings have become a very popular method of challenging patent validity for actual and...more