Estoppel Doctrine in China's Patent System
As any PTAB practitioner knows, the possibility of being estopped from asserting prior art in district court is a significant risk that must be considered when filing an IPR. Section 315(e)(2) prevents a petitioner, following...more
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit revived a petitioner’s validity challenge seeking ex parte review at the US Patent & Trademark Office (PTO), reversing a district court decision dismissing its complaint seeking...more
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit found that the Patent Trial & Appeal Board (Board) did not err in finding that a petitioner was estopped from maintaining a third inter partes review (IPR) of a patent claim...more
Facebook filed an inter partes review (IPR) petition against claims 1–8 of Uniloc 2017 LLC’s patent on Voice over Internet Protocol. Meanwhile, an IPR proceeding was already pending on claims 1–6 and 8 of the same patent,...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
The Federal Circuit’s recent Uniloc 2017 v. Facebook Inc. decision is a mixed bag of good and bad news for both patent owners and inter partes review petitioners. On the plus side for patent owners (but not for petitioners),...more
Wow—it was a busy week at the Court last week. Lots of opinions, and lots of precedential ones. There were lots of good choices out there, so we sort of threw a dart at a board to see which one to write about. In the end,...more
Network-1 sued HP, among others, for patent infringement. Another defendant then filed an inter partes review (IPR) petition. Following institution, HP filed its own petition on different grounds and a motion to join the...more
[co-author: Kathleen Wills] Last year, the global COVID-19 pandemic created unprecedented challenges for American courts. By making several changes, however, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit was able to...more
In General Access Sols., Ltd. v. Sprint Spectrum, et al., No. 2:20-cv-00007-RWS, ECF No. 128 (E.D. Tex. Dec. 1, 2020), the Eastern District of Texas denied a motion to strike invalidity defenses as barred by IPR estoppel for...more
In Network-1 Technologies, Inc. v. Hewlett-Packard Company, the Federal Circuit vacated and remanded the district court’s holding that joinder petitioner Hewlett Packard (“HP”) (1) could have tried to raise new grounds in its...more
AVX Corporation, a company that manufactures and sells a variety of electronic components including capacitors, petitioned for inter partes review (IPR) of Presidio Components, Inc.’s patent directed to single-layer ceramic...more
Smith & Nephew petitioned for inter partes review (IPR) of Arthrex’s patent. After the petition was filed, but before the Board issued an institution decision, Arthrex statutorily disclaimed all the challenged claims under 37...more
In 2018, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit docketed close to 600 appeals from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). That is the second highest number since starting to hear post-American Invents Act...more
When an IPR petition results in a final written decision, the IPR petitioner (or the petitioner’s real party in interest or privy) is estopped from asserting in a civil litigation or an ITC action that “the claim is invalid...more
The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit is poised to decide a case which may create new estoppel concerns for AIA petitioners under 35 USC § 315(e)(2). The appeal resulted from a Hatch-Waxman litigation in BTG v. Amneal,...more
As the boundaries of estoppel post-SAS continue to unfold, one court has found that if a petitioner’s time for appealing a PTAB partial-institution decision had not yet run out at the time that SAS was handed down, then the...more
Federal Circuit Sheds Some Light on How SAS May Impact Pending Appeals from the PTAB — Court Terminates Appeals of Partially-Instituted IPRs and Remands Back to the PTAB to Consider Non-Instituted “Claims and Grounds” in...more
PATENT CASE OF THE WEEK - WesternGeco LLC v. Ion Geophysical Corp., Appeal Nos. 2016-2099, -2100, -2101, -2332, -2333, -2334 (Fed. Cir. May 7, 2018) - In an appeal from an inter partes review, the Federal Circuit...more
At this point, several cases have examined the appealability of the Board’s institution decisions in inter partes review (“IPR”) proceedings. See, e.g., Cuozzo Speed Techs., LLC v. Lee, 136 S. Ct. 2131, 2142 (2015) (holding...more