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Federal Circuit Schedules Oral Hearing in First Appeal of Inter Partes Review

The Federal Circuit has scheduled oral arguments for the first appeal of an inter partes review ("IPR") decision by the Patent Trial and Appeal Board ("PTAB"). Oral arguments have beenscheduled for November 3, 2014. The appeal involves a number of interesting issues. First, it arises from the first IPR filed with the PTAB—Garmin USA, Inc. […]

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Legitimate Advocacy and Genuine Misrepresentation of Material Facts

The Federal Circuit has issued a decision inApotex Inc. v. UCB, Inc., upholding a district court's finding that Apotex's U.S. Patent No. 6,767,556 ("the '556 patent") is unenforceable due to inequitable conduct. Dr. Sherman, founder and chairman of Apotex, wrote the '556 patent application and is its sole inventor. The '556 is based on Canadian […]

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Critical Versus Optional, but Desireable Claim Elements

On August 6, 2014, the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals issued its opinion in ScriptPro, LLC v. Innovation Associates, Inc. In 2006, the Petitioner ScriptPro, LLC sued Innovation Associates, Inc. for infringement of claims 1, 2, 4, and 8 of U.S. Patent No. 6,910,601 ("the '601 patent"). The '601 patent describes a "collating unit" that […]

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Federal Circuit Invalidates Patent Claims As Non-Patentable Subject Matter

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit's recent decision in Digitech Image Technologies v. Electronics for Imaging, Inc., upheld a decision that patent claims directed to a collection of numerical data that lacks a physical component or manifestation as well as an abstract idea of organizing data through mathematical correlations are invalid. The […]

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USPTO Patent Invalidation Precludes Judicial Equitable Remedies and Sanctions

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has issued a decision inePlus, Inc. v. Lawson. ePlus sued Lawson asserting infringement of two patents—U.S. Patent Nos. 6,023,683 ("the '683 patent") and 6,505,172 ("the '172 patent"). At trial, the district court held two of ePlus's asserted system claims and three of ePlus's asserted method claims […]

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Federal Circuit Weighs in on Stays for Post-Grant Review

The Federal Circuit has issued an opinion in VirtualAgility Inc. v. Salesforce.com, Inc., providing clarification regarding how court should properly determine whether to stay litigation during later-requested post-grant PTO proceedings. Under the America Invents Act, a district court is permitted, but not required, to grant such a stay. The statute also provides a list of […]

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PTO Interference Decisions do not Preclude Invalidity Defenses in Court

The Federal Circuit has issued a decision in AbbVie v. Janssen Biotech and Centocor Biologics, which relates to patents that broadly cover antibodies which can neutralize activity of human interleukin 12 (IL-12) and have useful application in the treatment of autoimmune disorders. The patent owner, AbbVie, sued Janssen and Centocor for infringement of the patents […]

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Federal Circuit Holds Common Sense Cannot Establish Presence of an Element

The Federal Circuit's recent decision in K/S HIMPP v. Hear-Wear Technologies presents an interesting development in the law of obviousness. In affirming a finding of non-obviousness by the PTO Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences ("BPAI"), the Federal Circuit held that while common sense or basic knowledge may provide a reason to combine elements present […]

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Internet Discussion Systems as Prior Art

The Federal Circuit's recent decision inSuffolk Technologies, LLC, v. AOL Inc., and Google Inc., adds another item to the list of "printed publications" that may preclude patenting of a claimed invention: posts on internet newsgroups. In June 2012 Suffolk Technologies, LLC sued Google Inc. for infringement of U.S. Patent No. 6,081,835 ("the '835 patent"), related […]

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Federal Circuit Finds Clones Unpatentable

The Federal Circuit issued its opinion in In re Roslin Institute, a case involving cloned animals. The Roslin Institute (Roslin) owns a patent for methods of cloning animals, based on the work that created Dolly the Sheep. The inventors of that patent also assigned to Roslin an application claiming protection for the clones themselves. During […]

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