Section 112

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A patent interference is an adversarial proceeding where each party is trying deprive its opponent of a patent on an invention that that the Patent Office has already decided is patentable. Long after the AIA became effective to phase out interferences, the Patent Trial and Appeal Board continues to declare and administer them where at least one of the parties has an interfering application or patent predating the AIA’s enactment. The Board declares interferences to avoid the embarrassment and marketplace chaos where the Patent Office issues two patents on the same invention to different parties, and to avoid awarding a patent monopoly to the entity who was not the first to invent.
Continue Reading Mine Your Patent Application and You Might Find a Licensee

The Federal Circuit’s recent decision in Samsung Electronics America, Inc. v. Prisua Engineering Corp., Appeals 2019-1169, -1260 (Fed. Cir. Feb. 4, 2020), is remarkable, but not for its holding: “the Board may not cancel claims for indefiniteness in an IPR proceeding.” After 10,000 IPRs, hardly anyone thought otherwise. But it’s interesting nonetheless that someone so boldly tried to persuade the Board and the court otherwise. A $4.3 million willful infringement judgment will lead even the biggest of corporations to give it a try.
Continue Reading Come on, Board, Finish What You Started

In re Global IP Holdings LLC, Appeal 2018-1426 (Fed. Cir. July 5,2019), concerns patent law’s written description requirement, under 35 USC § 112. The patentee is trying to reissue its patent on a carpeted load floor of a car. The patented floor includes thermoplastic components. The components, according to the patentee, ought not have been limited to thermoplastics, rather each should have been any plastic. So, the patentee sought to reissue the patent with a claim to the broader invention. The Patent Office examiner rejected the revised claim.
Continue Reading Is the Written Description Requirement a Nose of Wax?

The Patent Trial and Appeal Board has received 37 petitions for post grant review of patents issuing from examination conducted by the Patent Office’s Group Art Unit 1600. The Board has issued four final written decisions thus far.  We discussed the first final written decision here, where all claims were upheld in the face of a challenge based on obviousness grounds only.  Three of the four final written decisions issued so far on biotech/pharma subject matter dealt only with art-based challenges.  Grünenthal GmbH v. Antecip Bioventures II LLC, Case PGR2017-00008 (June 22, 2018) marks the first PGR final written decision addressing written description of a patent arising from Art Unit 1600; all claims were held to be unpatentable under Section 112.
Continue Reading PTAB Issues First Biotech/Pharma PGR Final Written Decision Based On Written Description Challenge

In General Hospital Corp. v. Sienna Biopharmaceuticals, Inc., Case No. 2017-1012 (Fed. Cir. May 4, 2018), the Federal Circuit affirmed the PTAB’s August 2016 decision that General Hospital Corporation’s (GHC) claims involved in an interference proceeding (that GHC requested) failed to meet the written description requirement. But the court also vacated the PTAB’s denial of GHC’s contingent motion to add a new claim as arbitrary and capricious because the PTAB did not follow its own Standing Order. The court therefore remanded the case to the PTAB to decide remaining issues in the interference.
Continue Reading Federal Circuit Splits Hairs in Hair Removal Product Interference Proceeding

PTAB Failed to Properly Apply Incorporation by Reference Doctrine

In Paice LLC, The Abell Foundation, Inc., v. Ford Motor Company, Appeal No. 2017-1406 (Fed. Cir. Feb. 1, 2018), the Federal Circuit reversed a PTAB decision for failing to properly apply the doctrine of incorporation by reference, thereby reminding the PTAB as well as practitioners alike of the proper standard for invoking and applying that doctrine.
Continue Reading PTAB Failed to Properly Apply Incorporation by Reference Doctrine

In Hologic, Inc. v. Smith & Nephew Inc., No. 2017-1389 (Fed. Cir. Mar. 14, 2018), the Federal Circuit concluded that disclosure of a species provides written descriptive support for a claimed genus where the invention was in a predicable field of art, the species was a well-known member of the genus, and other members of the genus were also well known. As a result, the court affirmed the PTAB’s decision that Smith & Nephew’s PCT application (the “Emanuel PCT”) had sufficient written description to qualify as a priority document, and therefore was not prior art. In reaching this decision, the court relied heavily on the fact that the field of the invention was a predictable art.
Continue Reading Written Description of a Genus Can Be Satisfied by Disclosure of Single Species in Predictable Arts

PTABWatch Takeaway: Claims that recite the term “means” may trigger the means-plus-function presumption under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. § 112 ¶ 6 (Section 112(f) of the AIA), but the presumption can be overcome where: (1) the means term itself recites structure; (2) that structure is “common parlance” to those of ordinary skill in the art; and (3) the claim does not recite any function for the means term to perform.

In Skky, Inv. v. MindGeek, SARL, Appeal 16-2018 (Fed. Cir. June 7, 2017), the Federal Circuit upheld the PTAB’s decision that the claim term “wireless device means” of U.S. Patent 7,548,875 (the “’875 patent”) was not a means-plus-function term pursuant to Section 112 ¶ 6.Continue Reading How to Overcome a Section 112 ¶ 6 Means-Plus-Function Presumption

In a CBM appeal, TransPerfect Global, Inc. v. Matal, No. 2016-1121 (Fed. Cir. July 12, 2017) (non-prec.), the Federal Circuit determined that the PTAB correctly construed the word “said” in the claim term “said hyperlink,” and determined that TransPerfect’s challenged claims were unpatentable for lack of written description. The court’s claim construction analysis is thorough and well supported, but the treatment of the challenged patent as CBM-eligible appears to be inconsistent with Federal Circuit precedent.
Continue Reading PTAB Correctly Construed “Said” and Canceled Claims—but Was the Patent CBM Eligible?

Reluctant to Reverse, the Federal Circuit Offers the PTAB a Mulligan

The Federal Circuit recently vacated the PTAB’s decisions in three interferences. Board of Trustees of Leland Stanford Jr. Univ. v. Chinese Univ. of Hong Kong, Appeal 2015-2011 (Fed. Cir. June 27, 2017). These interferences concern which parties’ inventors first conceived methods for diagnosing fetal aneuploidies using cell-free fetal DNA from maternal blood samples. The PTAB concluded that two patents it issued to Stanford’s inventors and their pending application lacked an adequate description of the interfering invention and, thus, entered judgment against Stanford. The Federal Circuit determined, however, that the PTAB failed to properly assess the description in Stanford’s patents and application and, thus, vacated the PTAB’s decisions. The court’s disposition is an example of how even a fact-intensive inquiry, reviewed on appeal with substantial deference, can be shown to have been misguided, leading to an appellant’s success.
Continue Reading Reluctant to Reverse, the Federal Circuit Offers the PTAB a Mulligan

Resources & Info

Arthrex and the Supreme Court Resource Center

In United States v. Arthrex, Inc., the Supreme Court has heard whether 125+ PTAB decisions rendered through October 2019 must be remanded for new decisions. Read about how that issue developed through our post.

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Our Team

PTABWatch, provided by Marshall, Gerstein & Borun LLP, analyzes and reports recent developments concerning Post-Grant Proceedings at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), including Inter Partes Review (IPR), Post Grant Review (PGR), and Covered Business Method (CBM) proceedings.