Patent Law Practice Center

USPTO proposes new rules for PTAB administrative trials

Several weeks ago, the United States Patent and Trademark Office published proposed rule changes that will, if adopted, amend the rules for practice before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB). The deadline to comment on the USPTO proposed rule changes will be 60 days after publication in the Federal Register, which should be Monday, October 19, 2015. Comments should be sent by electronic mail message over the Internet addressed to: trialrules2015@uspto.gov. Comments may also be submitted by mail addressed to: Mail Stop Patent Board, Director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office, P.O. Box 1450, Alexandria, VA 22313-1450, marked to the attention of Lead Judge Susan Mitchell, Patent Trial Proposed Rules.

Claim Construction

In the initial request for comments, the Office asked the patent community, “Under what circumstances, if any, should the Board decline to construe a claim in an unexpired patent in accordance with its broadest reasonable construction in light of the specification of the patent in which it appears?”

Not surprisingly, by and large, the Office decided to stick with the broadest reasonable interpretation (“BRI”) approach, explaining that the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit recently determined that that the Office is authorized to employ the broadest reasonable interpretation approach when construing terms of an unexpired patent at issue in an inter partes review. The Office did, however, choose to adopt the Phillips standard for claim construction for claims of a patent that will expire prior to the issuance of a final decision.

Motions to Amend

One of the biggest issues many have had with current PTAB trial practice relates to the fact that the law says that the patent owner has a right to amend, but that well over 90% of the time, the PTAB denies patent owners the ability to amend. The Office asked for comments on the following topic: “What modifications, if any, should be made to the Board’s practice regarding motions to amend?”

In declining to make substantive changes to amendment practice, the Office explained that  MasterImage 3D, Inc. v. RealD, Inc. Case IPR2015-00040 clarifies that a patent owner must argue for the patentability of the proposed substitute claims over the prior art of record, including any art provided in light of a patent owner’s duty of candor, and any other prior art or arguments supplied by the petitioner, in conjunction with the requirement that the proposed substitute claims be narrower than the claims that are being replaced. Further, the decision also stands for the proposition that the burden of production shifts to the petitioner once the patent owner has made its prima facie case for patentability of the amendment, although the ultimate burden of persuasion remains with the patent owner.

Other Issues

Other issues addressed in the proposed rules include: (1) amending the rules to allow the patent owner to file new testimonial evidence with its preliminary response; (2) the Office declining to adopt a mandatory rule regarding additional discovery of secondary considerations; (3) permitting a patent owner to raise a challenge regarding a real party-in-interest or privity at any time during a trial proceeding; (4) declining a proposal that would allow a petitioner’s reply as of right in the pre-institution phase of an AIA review; (5) denying to provide for small entity and micro-entity filing fee reduction for reviews under AIA; and (6) Rule 11-type certification for all papers filed with the Board with a provision for sanctions for noncompliance.

USPTO seeks comment on post grant initiation pilot program

The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has published a request for comments on a proposed pilot program pertaining to the institution and conduct of post grant administrative trials. The America Invents Act (AIA), which was signed into law on September 16, 2011, provides for the following post grant administrative trials: Inter Partes Review (IPR), Post-Grant Review (PGR), and Covered Business Method Review (CBM). These new administrative procedures became available on September 16, 2012, one year after the signing of the AIA.

The USPTO currently has a panel of three Administrative Patent Judges (APJs) determine whether to institute a trial, and then normally has the same panel conduct the trial, if a decision is made to institute a trial. The USPTO is now considering a pilot program where the determination of whether to institute an IPR would be made by a single APJ. If the decision is to institute a proceeding, two additional APJs would be assigned to the IPR, joining the APJ who decided to institute the trial. (more…)

Top 5 Patent Law Blog Posts of the Week

Today we continue our weekly installment highlighting the best of the patent blogosphere from the past week. If there are any patent blogs you think should be highlighted by our Top 5, please comment on this post and we’ll check them out.

1) Whitehouse.gov: Help Us Shape Our Strategy for Intellectual Property Enforcement – This post from The White House Blog was written by Victoria Espinel, U.S. Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator. The purpose is to announce the Executive Office of the President’s newest initiative to develop a “new strategy of intellectual property enforcement”. Public comments on how to efficiently combat intellectual property infringement are being requested for this Strategy. For more info, click here.

2) Patents Post-Grant: Enhanced Patent Reexamination Speed Coming Soon? – This post from Oblon Spivak’s Scott McKeown discusses how the reduction in incoming requests and how these new options for contested proceedings will free up much of the Central Reexamination Unit’s examiner’s time. As such, this post suggests ex parte patent reexamination filings could potentially benefit from the newly available bandwidth.

3) Patently-O: Supreme Court Grants Cert in Already v. Nike – This post reports on Already, LLC dba Yums v. Nike, Inc., No. 11-982, and how the Supreme Court’s grant of certiorari in this trademark law matter could impact patent litigation.

4) Patent Docs: USPTO Takes Next Step Towards Cooperative Patent Classification System – This post shares the USPTO’s announcement in the Federal Register that on July 10, 2012, it will be hosting a Cooperative Patent Classification (CPC) External User Day event (77 Fed. Reg. 37879). During the event, the USPTO will provide an overview of the CPC, a new patent classification system being jointly developed by the USPTO and the European Patent Office (EPO).

5) IP Watchdog: Practice Before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board – This post discusses the impact of the September 16th implementation of the new post grant review procedures on law firms and the USPTO alike. The post explains the new Patent Trial and Appeal Board and its duties, the hiring of new Administrative Patent Judges “at an astounding rate”, and what the new proposed trial rules will mean to patent lawyers.