Addressing the issues of claim construction and the requisite expert qualifications to testify on obviousness and anticipation, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit vacated a Patent Trial & Appeal Board decision...more
The concept of the "person of ordinary skill in the art" (POSITA) remains pivotal in patent law, particularly in evaluating obviousness under 35 U.S.C. § 103 and compliance with enablement and written description requirements...more
The Federal Circuit’s decision in Kyocera Senco Industrial Tools Inc. v. International Trade Commission articulated a bright-line test for patent expert admissibility: to testify from the perspective of a “person of ordinary...more
It is well-established that the availability of a prior art reference is dependent on the “effective filing date” of a patent or patent application. Any practitioner seeking to invalidate a patent knows that the ideal...more
Combining Abstract Ideas Does Not Make Them Less Abstract - In Broadband Itv, Inc. v. Amazon.Com, Inc., Appeal No. 23-1107, the Federal Circuit held that when assessing patent eligibility under 35 U.S.C. § 101, combining two...more
Last week, in Osseo Imaging, LLC v. Planmeca USA Inc., No. 2023-1627 (Fed. Cir. Sept. 4, 2024), the Federal Circuit held that “[a]n expert need not have acquired the skill level prior to the time of the invention to be able...more
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit clarified that a technical expert does not need to have been a person of ordinary skill in the art (POSITA) at the time of the invention. Instead, they may rely on...more
A district court recently precluded a patent attorney from testifying as an expert in a patent infringement lawsuit where the proposed expert lacked the requisite technical expertise to assist the trier of fact in...more
RAI Strategic Holdings, Inc. v. Phillip Morris Products S.A., No. 2022-1862 (Fed. Cir. February 9, 2024) addressed two issues: (1) when the written description requirement is met in the context of a claimed range that is...more
The Patent Trial and Appeal Board held all challenged claims of IGT’s patent unpatentable as obvious over two prior art patents. Zynga Inc. v. IGT, IPR2022-00199-32. In doing so, the PTAB further held that, contrary to...more
In part 1 of this series, I introduced the “on sale bar” and described how a commercial sale or offer for sale can negate patentability, according to the doctrine the Supreme Court established in Pfaff v. Wells Elecs., Inc....more
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
The Supreme Court's decision to grant certiorari in Amgen v. Sanofi is the first time in almost a hundred years that the Court has deigned to consider sufficiency of disclosure decisions, in this case enablement under 35...more
On October 17, 2022, Justice St-Louis of the Federal Court granted a motion for summary trial brought by Teva, Pharmascience, Laboratoire Riva, Apotex and Mylan (the Defendants) and dismissed the underlying actions of Lilly...more
Director of the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) Kathi Vidal recently designated as precedential a decision by the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) rejecting the petitioner’s invalidity challenge, since it was based...more
In Mylan Pharm. Inc. v. Merck Sharp & Dohme Corp., the Federal Circuit considered whether prior disclosure of a genus of compounds and their pharmaceutically acceptable salts was sufficient to anticipate, under 35 U.S.C....more
LG ELECTRONICS INC. v. IMMERVISION INC. Before Stoll, Cunningham, and Newman, Appeal from the United States Patent and Trademark Office, Patent Trial and Appeal Board. Summary: Where a reference contains an “obvious”...more
In Ethicon LLC v. Intuitive Surgical, Inc., the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (“CAFC”) upheld a finding from the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (“Board”) the claims of Ethicon’s patent directed to a surgical stapler...more
Case Name: Novartis Pharms. Corp. v. Accord Healthcare, Inc., No. 2021-1070, 2022 WL 16759 (Fed. Cir. Jan. 3, 2022) (Circuit Judges Moore, Linn, and O’Malley presiding; Opinion by O’Malley, J.; Dissenting Opinion by Moore,...more
On April 7, 2022, the Federal Court issued its judgment and reasons in Angelcare Canada Inc et al v Munchkin Inc et al (2022 FC 507), finding that Munchkin, Inc and Munchkin Baby Canada Ltd (the “Defendants” or “Munchkin”)...more
Last week, a split Federal Circuit panel reversed a decision invalidating certain computer-aided-design patent claims because the district court used an incorrect indefiniteness standard....more
Last week wrapped up a busy January for the Federal Circuit. Oral arguments returned to a telephonic format, and arguments next month will be by video (although still audio-only for the public). As the month is now in the...more
Addressing a US International Trade Commission (ITC) decision finding a § 337 violation as to one patent but no violation as to four other patents, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reiterated that a technical...more
On November 19th, Senior Party Sigma-Aldrich filed its Substantive Preliminary Motion No. 1 in CRISPR Interference No. 106,132 (where the Broad Institute, Harvard University and MIT, collectively, "Broad" is the Junior Party)...more
Biogen International GMBH, Biogen MA, Inc., v. Mylan Pharmaceuticals Inc. marks the Federal Circuit’s most recent interpretation of the 35 U.S.C. § 112 written description requirement in the Hatch-Waxman context. No....more