Intellectual Property

The United States Patent and Trademark Office (“USPTO”) introduced the Ombudsman Program on April 6, 2010 with the ostensible goal of advancing patent applications that have stalled during the examination process.

On Friday, October 28, 2016, musicians Mark Ronson and Bruno Mars were hit with a copyright infringement suit based on their wildly popular hit “Uptown Funk.”

On November 2, 2016 the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) issued a memo to Examiners on its stance on subject matter eligibility in response to the McRO and BASCOM Federal Circuit decisions, previously discussed at Global IP Matters.

Someone stole your invention and filed for a patent on it? Derivation proceedings in the Patent Office may be an answer. The Leahy-Smith America Invents Act (AIA) amended 35 U.S.C. § 135 to replace interference proceedings with a new process called derivation proceedings.

Several recent court decisions have shed light on the patent agent privilege, and now the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is seeking to weigh-in on the issue.

On October 19, 2016, the ITC instituted Investigation No. 1025, based on a complaint filed on May 26, 2016, by Silicon Genesis Corporation (SiGen), against Soitec, S.A. (Soitec). As part of the institution, the ITC ordered that the ALJ issue an early initial determination regarding whether SiGen “has satisfied the economic prong of the domestic industry requirement.”

Since Kyle Bass founded Coalition for Affordable Drugs X LLC (CFAD) to challenge pharmaceutical patents, CFAD has filed numerous petitions with the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (Office) seeking to institute inter partes review (IPR) proceedings to invalidate a number of pharmaceutical patents, including three patents owned by Anacor Pharmaceuticals, Inc., as previously discussed at Global IP Matters.

The Federal Circuit reaffirmed last week that the Patent Trial and Appeal Board’s (PTAB’s) decision to discontinue inter partes review (IPR) proceedings is not reviewable on appeal.

The Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) recently designated Ex parte Schulhauser, Appeal 2013-007847 (PTAB April 28, 2016), as precedential.  In this decision the Board clarified how to interpret method and system claims that include conditional language.

Disavowal can occur when a patent holder disavows the full scope of claim terms in the specification or during prosecution (e.g., through the doctrine of prosecution history estoppel). In either event, disavowal requires clear and unequivocal evidence that the claimed invention includes or does not include a particular feature. 

For the first time in 26 years, the FTC and DOJ (the “Agencies”) have issued proposed updates to the Antitrust Guidelines for the Licensing of Intellectual Property, last revised in 1995.

Plaintiffs bringing patent infringement complaints under the Iqbal/Twombly pleading standard should take notice.  On September 30, 2016, a panel of the Federal Circuit affirmed a district court’s dismissal of a deficient complaint under Rule 12(b)(6).

As a patent owner involved in patent litigation, you must consider numerous factors when negotiating a settlement agreement. An important contemplation is timing, because finalizing a settlement agreement at the wrong juncture of your legal proceedings can have devastating results.

We’ll start with the first question a patent attorney might ask you: Have you told anyone about your invention?

The Federal Circuit recently determined that it lacked jurisdiction to review the Patent Trial and Appeal Board’s determination that assignor estoppel has no affect in an inter partes review (“IPR”).

The Federal Circuit relied on Nautilus to preserve functional language of a method claim in a decision published last Friday.  In Cox Comm, Inc. v. Sprint, No. 2016-1013, the Federal Circuit held that the term “processing system” did not render the asserted claims indefinite.

On remand from the Supreme Court’s decision in Halo Elecs., Inc. v. Pulse Elecs., Inc., 136 S. Ct. 1923 (2016), the Federal Circuit recently issued a revised decision in Stryker Corp. v. Zimmer, Inc., No. 2013-1668 (Fed. Cir. 2016). The decision provides insight into the court’s interpretation of the Halo standard and enhanced damages.

Three attorneys from Mintz Levin’s IP and Employment practices are featured writers in the American Bar Association’s Business Law Today publication, explaining the ins-and-outs of the Defend Trade Secrets Act (DTSA).

Two years after the Central District of California invalidated two 3-D animation patents under Section 101, the Federal Circuit reversed that court’s decision, finding that the lower court oversimplified the claims of a computer-related invention.

On September 9, 2016, Apotex Inc. filed a petition for writ of certiorari in the U.S. Supreme Court seeking review of the Federal Circuit’s decision in Amgen Inc. v. Apotex Inc., Case No. 2016-1308.