Patent Law Practice Center

CAFC Sends Dismissed Interference Back to Board

The United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit recently decided a case arising out of an interference proceeding before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) relating to drug treatments for spinal nerve injuries. See Tobinick v. Olmarker (Fed. Cir., May 19, 2014).

Kjell Olmarker and Bjorn Rydevik (collectively “Olmarker”) are the named inventors on U.S. Patent Nos. 7,708,995 and 7,811,990. In order to provoke an interference, Edward Tobinick copied claims from the ‘995 patent and the ‘990 patent into his patent application.

In the USPTO proceeding, the Board construed “administered locally” as administering the claimed therapeutic compound “directly to the site where it is intended to act, that is, to the location where the nucleus pulposus is causing the symptoms of the nerve disorder.” Based on this construction, the Board found that Edward Tobinick’s patent application did not contain written description support for the interference count. Therefore, without written description support for the count, the Board concluded that Tobinick lacked standing for the interference proceeding, and dismissed the interference.

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Courtenay Brinckerhoff: What Happens When Interfering Applications Straddle The First-To-File Effective Date?

The following article comes from Courtenay C. Brinckerhoff, Partner at Foley & Lardner and writer of PharmaPatents Blog. 

It has been a while since I’ve taken an in-depth look at the first-to-file provisions of the America Invents Act. This interesting fact pattern comes from Andrea Levesque, IP Counsel at ARC Energy, and relates to the interference provisions that survive the general March 16, 2013 effective date of the first-to-file provisions.

The March 16, 2013 Effective Date

As I wrote previously, one of the more complex aspects of the America Invents Act relates to the effective date and applicability of the first-to-file provisions of new 35 USC § 102. As a general rule, applications with any claim that has an effective filing date on or after March 16, 2013 will be subject to the new version of § 102. On the other hand, applications with any claim that has an earlier effective filing date still will be subject to the current versions of 35 USC §§ 102(g), 135 and 291: (more…)

Goeddel V. Sugano: What’s The Difference Between “Envisioning” An Invention And Being “In Possession” Of The Invention?

The following post was written by Gerald M. Murphy, partner at Birch, Stewart, Kolasch & Birch, LLP and Practice Center Contributor.

In Goeddel v. Sugano, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) has provided more guidance as to what is necessary for a sufficient “written description” of an invention, this time for a true “biotech” invention, in the context of a motion for benefit of priority in an interference.  This case involved two interferences; one directed to DNA encoding human fibroblast interferon (hFIF) unaccompanied by a hFIF presequence (mature hFIF) and one directed to a composition comprising  non-glycosylated hFIF.  Sugano filed a motion for benefit of its Japanese priority application (Sugano priority application) and was granted priority by the Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences (the Board) in both interferences.  Goeddel appealed that decision on the grounds that the Sugano priority application did not constitute a constructive reduction to practice because it did not enable the Counts and did not provide a sufficient written description of the Counts.  The Federal Circuit reversed on the ground that the Sugano priority application did not provide a sufficient written description of the Count because the inventors were not “in possession” of the invention. (more…)