by Dennis Crouch

A potentially important product design trademark case is pending before the U.S. Supreme Court involving those chocolate covered bready-sticks. Ezaki Glico Kabushiki Kaisha v. Lotte International America Corp., Docket No. 20-1817 (Supreme Court 2021). 

Glico’s Pocky product has been sold since 1966 and are apparently popular. Lotte’s Pepero’s are a knock-off version. Glico sued for trademark infringement, asserting Glico’s trademark rights in the product design of chocolate-covered elongated rod biscuits. Glico registered this particular mark back in 1989. Reg. No. 1,527,208.

The lawsuit ended fairly quickly. The district court found that the design is functional and therefore not protectable by trademark.  On appeal, the 3rd Circuit affirmed.

If you have eaten one of these, then you know a bit about the shape functionality:

1. Biscuit end can be handled without getting chocolate on your hands;
2. Rod design allows for close-packing in a compact box suitable for sharing;
3. Rod design allows for eating “one bite at a time … without opening your mouth
   wide.”

According to the third circuit, these aspects were utilitarian and therefore functional as a matter of law.

In its petition, Glico presents the following questions:

The Lanham Act protects trade dress from unlawful copying. Trade dress includes a product’s design, such as the red wax seal on a bottle of Maker’s Mark, the shape of the Chanel No. 5 perfume bottle, and the configuration of the Pepperidge Farm Milano cookie. To qualify for trade dress protection, a product’s design cannot be “functional,” among other requirements. At issue in this case is the test for “functionality” in trade dress law and the role of alternative product designs in creating a dispute of fact that prevents summary judgment. This petition presents two questions:

1. Whether trade dress is “functional” if it is “essential to the use or purpose of the article” or “affects the cost or quality of the article,” as this Court and nine circuit courts have held, or if it is merely “useful” and “nothing more,” as the Third Circuit held below.

2. Whether the presence of alternative designs serving the same use or purpose creates a question of fact with respect to functionality, where the product’s design does not affect cost or quality and is not claimed in a utility patent.

[Petition].  AIPLA, IPO, and INTA have all filed briefs supporting certiorari.  Their argument is that the Third Circuit used an unduly expansive definition of “functional” that is contrary to the precedent of the Supreme Court and every other circuit court of appeals.

The briefs include lots of pictures of chocolate covered cookies (biscuits).

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Glico also holds a patent titled “Stick-shaped snack and method for producing the same.”  U.S. Patent No. 8,778,428.  The US patent claims a particular method of making these tasty snacks as well as “A stick-shaped snack made by the [claimed] method.” (product-by-process claim) The district court found the patent relevant to showing functionality. On appeal though, the Third Circuit disagreed since the patent focused on a particular method of manufacture rather than novel features of the product itself.  There is also a Japanese Utility Model patent but did not feature in the litigation.

by Dennis Crouch

The NHK-Fintiv Rule provides the PTAB with authority to deny institution of IPR proceedings when the challenged patent is already subject to pending parallel district court litigation.  The rule stems from two PTAB decisions that were later designated as precedential.

• NHK Spring Co., Ltd. v. Intri-Plex Techs., Inc., IPR2018-00752, 2018 WL 4373643 (Patent Tr. & App. Bd. Sept. 12, 2018), designated precedential on May 7, 2019.
• Apple Inc. v. Fintiv, Inc., IPR2020-00019, 2020 WL 2126495 (Patent Tr. & App. Bd. Mar. 20, 2020), designated precedential on May 5, 2020.

IPR proceedings have two major decision points.  Institution: After IPR petition is filed, the PTO Director determines whether or not to institute the IPR. The statute provides the director with discretionary authority on whether or not to institute the IPR, but does create a threshold — requiring that the petition show at least “a reasonable likelihood that the petitioner would prevail.” 35 U.S.C. 314.  Also, the PTO Director has delegated their institution authority to the PTAB, and so a PTAB panel actually makes the decision.  Final Decision: If the IPR is instituted then the PTAB is charged with holding a trial and reaching a final decision “with respect to the patentability of any patent claim challenged.”  On the other hand, if institution is denied, the case is over and no appeal is permitted. “The determination by the Director whether to institute an inter partes review under this section shall be final and nonappealable.” 35 U.S.C. 314(d).  Note here that “nonappealable” has been generally interpreted as ordinarily not appealable. See Cuozzo Speed Technologies, LLC v. Lee, 136 S. Ct. 2131 (2016) and Thryv, Inc. v. Click-To-Call Technologies, LP, 140 S. Ct. 1367 (2020).

With NHK-Fintiv, PTAB panels are able to use their discretionary authority to deny institution in situations involving parallel litigation guided by a six-factor test that generally dance around the overarching question of whether “instituting a trial would be an inefficient use of Board resources.”

by Dennis Crouch

Most patents involve two or more joint inventors who all claim to have contributed significantly to the invention.  Conception of the invention is typically seen as the critical legal determinant of invention and some courts have written that each joint inventor must have contributed substantially to the conception of the invention.*  Conception is typically referred to as a mental act. The MPEP, for example, includes a statement in all-caps that “CONCEPTION MUST BE DONE IN THE MIND OF THE INVENTOR.”  MPEP 2138.04(I).  The basic rule is that the inventor must have a “definite and permanent idea of the complete and operable invention.”

The mind-of-the-inventor doctrines have several problems, today I’m thinking about one relating to joint inventorship.  As far as I know, the definitional cases regarding conception refer to “the inventor” as if inventorship is a solo process.  But 75% of new patents list two or more inventors who are unlikely to have experienced joint or simultaneous conception.  It turns out though that simultaneous conception is not required. Rather, this is how it works.

• Multiple human people provide significant contributions toward a complete invention;
• At some point, one of the individuals puts on the pieces together in a manner sufficient to be called conception.
• Although only one person conceived, all of the contributors receive credit for the conception as joint inventors, even if they never understood the full invention.

This setup played out in the Federal Circuit’s 2020 Dana-Farber decision, and the court confirmed that two Harvard researchers who contributed early on in the invention process deserved to be listed as co-inventors with Kyoto University’s Dr. Honjo even though it was Honjo who actually conceived of the invention. Dana-Farber Cancer Inst., Inc. v. Ono Pharm. Co., Ltd., 964 F.3d 1365 (Fed. Cir. 2020), cert. denied sub nom. Ono Pharm. Co., Ltd. v. Dana-Farber Cancer Inst., 20-1258, 2021 WL 2044661 (U.S. May 24, 2021)

In practice, the invention is defined and shaped by the patent prosecution process, and so my easy linear process above is often only something that can be seen retrospectively once we understand the actual scope of the claimed invention.

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* Above, I referred to conception as the key invention marker.  Of course, the law of invention states that the invention is not complete until the invention is reduced-to-practice (either actually or constructively).  Reduction-to-practice takes the idea and verifies that it actually works in practice.  I think that RTP gets short shrift in the patent system, but the law is clear that a joint inventor’s contribution may be at that post-conception stage.  As Judge Lourie explained in Pannu v. Iolab Corp.:

All that is required of a joint inventor is that he or she (1) contribute in some significant manner to the conception or reduction to practice of the invention, (2) make a contribution to the claimed invention that is not insignificant in quality, when that contribution is measured against the dimension of the full invention, and (3) do more than merely explain to the real inventors well-known concepts and/or the current state of the art. 

Pannu v. Iolab Corp., 155 F.3d 1344 (Fed. Cir. 1998).

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Painting above is a portion of The Immaculate Conception by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo (1696–1770).

by Dennis Crouch

Here, the CAFC has vacated a PTAB IPR decision based upon a sua sponte claim construction. The court found that the agency did not provide the notice and opportunity to respond required by the Administrative Procedures Act (APA). 

Qualcomm Inc. v. Intel Corp., Appeal No. 20-1589 (Fed. Cir. 2021)

Intel filed six different IPR petitions challenging Qualcomm’s US Patent No. 9,608,675.  The PTAB complied and cancelled the challenged claims as obvious.  On appeal here, the Federal Circuit has vacated and remanded — holding that the Board’s sua sponte claim construction in its final written decision was unfair to the patentee because it did “failed to provide Qualcomm adequate notice of and opportunity to respond.”

The invention here relates to mobile phone signal amplifiers, and particularly to  “power tracking” circuitry used to measure the the power amplification over multiple signals and carriers. (“a plurality of carrier aggregated transmit signals”, exemplary claim 1).

The patent makes clear that a key purpose of using multiple signals is to increase  a user’s transmission bandwidth, but exemplary claim 1 does not expressly require that result. Still, Intel asked the PTAB to construe the “plurality of carrier … signals” as having the purpose “to increase the bandwidth for a user.”  Although Qualcomm disputed portions of Intel’s proposed construction, it did not argue against that port. It simply was not at issue, most likely because the same patent claim had already been construed in a separate case before the ITC using that exact language.

During a post-briefing claim construction hearing, a PTAB judge asked Intel’s attorney for textual support in specification for the proposed “increase the bandwidth” construction.   At that point, the attorney responded that Intel would also “be comfortable” with removing the bandwidth portion as an element of the construction.  The judge later responded during the hearing that “we’ll think about whether [that limitation is] necessary.”  Qualcomm’s attorney did respond raise the issue during the hearing. And, prior to that time, the issue of increased bandwidth was not in dispute.  The following day, the Board issued its claim construction that followed Intel’s proposed approach, but without the “increase the bandwidth” requirement.

On appeal, the court found this process improper as a violation of the Administrative Procedures Act (APA) process requirements.

• Parties to a hearing shall be informed of “the matters of fact and law asserted … and issued controverted.” 5 U.S.C § 554(a)-(b).
• The agency must provide opportunity for “(1) the submission and consideration of facts [and] arguments” 5 U.S.C § 554(c).
• “Parties are entitled to present their case . . . as may be required for a full and true disclosure of the facts.”  5 U.S.C § 555(d).

Collectively, these rules require that the patentee has notice of any grounds for cancelling its claims and also an opportunity to fully argue those grounds. The notice requirement does not require a formal summons served by a U.S. Marshall, but rather the Board must consider whether the parties should anticipate that the particular question is at issue.  In prior cases, the Federal Circuit found found when the PTAB “change[d] theories midstream or depart[ed] from a construction it previously adopted.”  Here, the situation was slightly different – an agreed upon claim construction.  Still, no one would anticipate that

Here, the patent owner agreed with the increased bandwidth requirement proposed by the petitioner. . . . it is . . . difficult to imagine either party anticipating that this agreed-upon matter of claim construction was a moving target. And, unlike with disputed terms, it is unreasonable to expect parties to brief or argue agreed-upon matters of claim construction. This is particularly true here given that a separate agency (the Commission) had already adopted the increased bandwidth requirement for the claim term. Accordingly, under the circumstances of this case, the Board needed to provide notice of and an adequate opportunity to respond to its construction.

Slip Op.

One Judge?: The opinion makes note that only one judge (of the three-member panel) asked a question regarding the claim construction and then the same judge also made a comment indicating that panel will “think about” whether the particular limitation is necessary.

“[O]ne judge asked Intel a single question about increasing bandwidth . . . Shortly thereafter, the same judge commented . . .  In sum, one judge asked one question about the increased bandwidth requirement, directed only at Intel, during the entire hearing. . . . The single question-answer exchange between one judge and Intel regarding the increased bandwidth requirement, followed by that judge’s offhand comment that the panel would “think about whether that’s necessary,” did not provide Qualcomm notice that the Board might depart from the increased bandwidth requirement.

Slip Op. I believe the appellate court is trying to imply that questions or comments from a single judge provides less notice than if two or even three of the judges had made comments on point.  I have not previously heard of this partial tribunal doctrine.

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So what. Errors generally must be meaningful in order to be appealable. Harmful errors vs harmless errors.  However, the Federal Circuit noted an ongoing open question as to whether an agency’s failure to comply with the APA requires harm.

Intel cites WesternGeco to assert Qualcomm’s APA challenge requires a showing of prejudice. We need not address whether WesternGeco requires such a showing because Qualcomm was prejudiced here.

In particular, Qualcomm had repeatedly argued that the prior art did not
“disclose the increased bandwidth requirement.”  “By removing that requirement [from the claims], the Board eliminated an element on which Intel bore the burden of proof.”

Vacated and Remanded.

by Dennis Crouch

Today’s decision by the Federal Circuit includes an example of thinly sliced bologna, with the court rejecting a PTAB IPR decision because the precise obviousness argument regarding a functional limitation was not expressly stated.  The court also does another go-round with the PTAB failing to consider commercial success. 

Oren Tech v. Proppant Express (Fed. Cir. 2021)

Lots of petroleum is trapped by deep rock formations that are difficult to drill-out one-by-one. Hydraulic fracturing (fracking) gets access to those stores by using high-pressure injection of a slurry of water, chemical additives and proppant (such as sand or other granular).  The high-pressure water causes cracking of the rocks. Proppant residue is left behind and holds the cracks open — allowing the petro to flow out more easily.

Oren’s parent company US Silica competes with PropX for delivering proppant (sand) for fracking.  As part of this competition, Oren holds several patents related to storage of proppant and sued PropX for infringement. US Patent Nos. 9,403,626; 9,511,929; and 9,296,518.  PropX responded with petitions for IPR.  This case involves the ‘626 patent and the PTAB’s ruling cancelling all the challenged claims as obvious. On appeal, the Federal Circuit has rejected the PTAB decision for two reasons: (1) the PTAB decision strayed too far from the grounds of unpatentability found in the petition; and (2) the PTAB improperly disregarded the commercial success of Oren’s container.

The ‘626 patent is directed to a stackable storage container for sand.  Each container has a bottom hinged-hatch that allows sand to flow to the next lower container and eventually out through the bottom of the stack.

The closest identified prior publication was the now-abandoned U.S. Patent Publication No. 2008/0226434 (“Smith”, image below).  During prosecution its patent, Oren had already encountered a Smith rejection, and overcame that rejection by adding a functional claim limitation that the container is designed to support “volumes” of “at least 30,000 pounds.”  Smith expressly limited its double container payload to 52,500 pounds, or 26,250 pounds each.   The examiner accepted this limitation as sufficient to skirt the prior art. 

The IPR Grounds: The IPR petition reintroduced Smith and argued that Smith’s design could be reinforced (via Hendrick) to take advantage of the unused volume and that the the 30,000 pound limit was already met by engineering safety tolerance.  The Board did not buy the safety tolerance argument since that was not mentioned in the reference, but still found that the 30,000 pound limit would be inherently met through the proposed reinforcement.

The problem: Although the IPR petition raised Smith, it did not raise this exact argument — that the proposed reinforcement would inherently satisfy the 30,000 pound requirement.

[T]he Board erred by repurposing the theory of a motivation to modify Smith to increase its capacity as a basis for finding the 30,000 pound limitation met. PropX did not assert this theory of obviousness in its petition. Nor was the theory raised by the Board’s institution decision (or at any time before the final written decision). Therefore, relying on this theory in finding claims obvious was reversible error because the petitioner bears the burden of proving obviousness and Oren had no notice or opportunity to respond.

Slip Op.

Does not sit well: The Federal Circuit’s conclusion here does not sit well with me since both the petition and the institution decision indicate that the purpose of the reinforcement was “increasing the maximum payload of Smith’s containers”; PropX provided evidence that the reinforcement would increase the payload beyond 30,000 pounds; and it was through the claimed reinforcement that Oren itself met the functional 30,000 pound limitation. It does appear true, however, that neither the petition nor institution decisions particularly stated that the increased payload would meet the claim limitation itself.  This decision comes down to a choice of how thin to slice the bologna.

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“The Reason” versus “A Reason” for the Commercial Success: Oren’s “Sandbox” product has also been commercially successful (sold through another US Silica company) and Oren presented that evidence as objective evidence of nonobviousness.   In this case, the product is “commensurate in scope” with the  patented claims — thus creating a presumption of nexus between the claims and the commercial success.  However, the Board still gave the commercial success no weight because PropX provided evidence that the success was due to a convoyed leasing program that included certain trade secrets as well as a “special forklift,” “special mats,” and “special truck,” and not the claimed features of the box.

On appeal, the Federal Circuit vacated this portion of the decision — holding that there can be a number of contributors to commercial success, and the PTAB failed to specifically consider Oren’s evidence showing that its container design was “also an important contributor to the commercial success and praise of the system.”

by Dennis Crouch

Obviousness is the central doctrine of patent law.  It is both the most common reason for rejection and often the most complicated issue because of both factual and legal complexities.  The new Chemours Co. decision provides an important addition to obviousness doctrine in two areas: (1) teaching away; and (2) commercial success.  The majority sided with the patentee and reversed the IPR Board’s single-reference obviousness determination.  The dissent argued that the opinion gives too much power to the teaching-away doctrine.

Chemours Company v. Daikin Industries (Fed. Cir. 2021)

Chemours is a 2015 spin-off from Du Pont. Its patents at issues here relate to a polymer having a high melt flow to allow high-speed extrusion to cover electrical wires.  U.S. Patent Nos. 7,122,609 and 8,076,431.  The claims require a standardized melt flow rate range: 30±3 g/10 min along with other physical properties.

Daikin petitioned for inter partes review, and the PTAB agreed that the claims were invalid as obvious based upon a single prior art reference, U.S. Patent No. 6,541,588 (“Kaulbach”).  Judge Dyk’s dissenting opinion in this case explains that “[t]he only material difference between [Chemours] claim 1 and Kaulbach is that Kaulbach discloses (in Sample A11) a melt flow rate of 24 g/10 min, slightly lower than 27 g/10 min, the lower bound of the 30 ± 3 g/10 min rate claimed in claim 1 of the ’609 patent.”  Actually, Kaulbach goes even further and expreslly discloses a melt flow rate of “15 g/10 min or greater” and includes the example of 24 g/10 min MFR.

On its face, Kaulbach discloses a flow rate that encompasses Chemours’ claimed rate — pretty good prima facie that this element was disclosed, but the Board hung its hat on the particular example and concluded that it would have been obvious to modify Kaulbach’s 24 example so that it fit Chemours’ 27 requirement.

The problem: Kaulbach also focused on having a narrow distribution of molecule sizes within its polymer, and those skilled in the art apparently did not know how to increasing flow rate from 24 to 27 while maintaining the narrow distribution. The Board resolved this tension in favor of an obviousness finding, but you can see that the Kaulbach inventors push against broad molecular weight approach:

[The prior art] mixtures have a very broad molecular weight distribution which according to conventional wisdom, results in an improved extrudability. . . . [However, our invention] has a very narrow molecular-weight distribution. i.e., a ratio of Mw to Mn of less than about 2.

Kaulbach prior art patent.

Teaching Away: On appeal, the Federal Circuit reversed the obviousness determination and held that the Board should have taken more care in considering Kaulbach’s teaching-away from broader molecular weight distribution:

[T]he Board appears to have ignored the express disclosure in Kaulbach that teaches away from the claimed invention and relied on teachings from other references that were not concerned with the particular problems Kaulbach sought to solve. In other words, the Board did not adequately grapple with why a skilled artisan would find it obvious to increase Kaulbach’s melt flow rate to the claimed range while retaining its critical “very narrow molecular-weight distribution.”

Slip Op.  You’ll note that an inventor would not need to shift far from Kaulbach’s 24 g/10 min example flow rate to get within Chemours’ claimed rate that includes about 27 g/10 min.  But, to do so pushes against the fundamental inventive concept of Kaulbach of a narrow molecular distribution. The PTAB’s decision “does not explain why a POSA would be motivated to increase Kaulbach’s melt flow rate to the claimed range, when doing so would necessarily involve altering the inventive concept of a narrow molecular weight distribution polymer.” Slip Op.  An important caveat here is that Chemours’ patent does not actually claim any particular molecular weight distribution, but expert testimony apparently convinced the Board that a broad molecular distribution was required.

In its decision, the majority concludes that the teaching-away negates a motivation to modify the prior art reference.  One oddity of the decision is that the court also spends some time reciting precedent on pertinent prior art, but does not apply that doctrine in any meaningful way.

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The majority opinion was authored by Judge Reyna and joined by Judge Newman. Judge Dyk wrote in partial dissent.  According to Judge Dyk, the majority placed too much weight on the teaching-away doctrine.

In particular, Judge Dyk reads the the prior art patent as providing an alternative narrow molecular weight distribution while also acknowledging the conventional wisdom and feasibility of having a high distribution. “This is not a teaching away from the use of a higher molecular weight distribution polymer. . . . The majority’s approach impermissibly expands the teaching away doctrine such that it encompasses a reference’s mere preference for a particular alternative. ” Slip Op. Dissent.

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Secondary Indicia of Nonobviousness: During the IPR, Chemours  presented evidence of commercial success as objective indicia of nonobviousness.  Generally, the commercial success of an invention can be used as circumstantial evidence to prove that the invention is non-obvious.  The basic idea here is that an obvious valuable invention would already be in the market place.  Since there are a number of reasons why any particular product might be successful, patent law generally requires a showing of nexus between the claimed invention and the success — that the innovation (rather than marketing or non-claimed design elements) is responsible for the commercial success.

Here, the Board found the commercial success evidence lacking and thus gave it no weight in the obviousness analysis.  On appeal, the Federal Circuit found three ways that the Board’s decision failed to follow the law.

Nexus and Commercial Success: First, the Board found no nexus because commercial success could not be tied directly to inventive contribution of the Chemours patents.  Here, the Board’s decision was odd.  The Board essentially found that the Chemours patent had no inventive contribution (i.e., had no points of novelty) and therefore could have no nexus.  On appeal, the Federal Circuit rejected that analysis as contrary to law.

The Board found no nexus between the claimed invention and the alleged commercial success because Kaulbach disclosed all features except for the claimed melt flow rate. The Board then found that other prior art of record disclosed melt flow rates of 50 g/10 min.

Contrary to the Board’s decision, the separate disclosure of individual limitations, where the invention is a unique combination of three interdependent properties, does not negate a nexus. Concluding otherwise would mean that nexus could never exist where the claimed invention is a unique combination of known elements from the prior art.

Slip op.

Market Share vs Sales Numbers: The Board also held that market share evidence (rather than merely sales numbers) is required for a showing of commercial success. The Federal Circuit disagreed. “[M]arket share data, though potentially useful, is not required to show commercial success.”

Blocking Patents: Still on Commercial Success, the Board also rejected the commercial success argument after finding that Chemours patents at issue blocked market competition — so that any commercial success would be due to the patent’s existence rather than the innovation’s marketability.   On appeal, the Federal Circuit rejected this conclusion also as contrary to law, finding that the Board totally misapplied the blocking patent doctrine.

The Board erred by misapplying the “blocking patents” doctrine to the challenged patents themselves. A blocking patent is one that is in place before the claimed invention because “such a blocking patent may deter non-owners and non-licensees from investing the resources needed to make, develop, and market such a later, ‘blocked’ invention.’” However, the challenged patent, which covers the claimed invention at issue, cannot act as a blocking patent.

Slip Op. On this point, while I agree that Board’s decision did not follow traditional blocking patent doctrine its approach is interesting.

by Dennis Crouch

Shure v. ClearOne (Fed. Cir. 2021)

I previously mentioned this appellate case and the oral arguments remarks by Chief Judge Moore suggesting that ClearOne file a motion for sanctions against Shure for bringing the appeal.

Stinging Oral Arguments from Chief Judge Moore

At the district court, N.D. Ill. Judge Edmond Chang had issued a preliminary injunction prohibiting Shure from certain actions regarding its drop-ceiling microphone product. Later, Judge Chang found that Shure had violated the preliminary injunction.  In its new opinion, the court has dismissed the case, finding that it lacks appellate jurisdiction over the interlocutory contempt order.  ClearOne has also moved for sanctions.

Right to Appeal: Although a losing party has a right to appeal, the rules of civil procedure strictly limit the timing of appeals.  Generally, a losing party has a right to appeal only after the case is fully and finally decided by the district court. 28 USC 1291.  This is known as the “final judgment rule.” The contempt order that Shure appealed did not end the case. Rather the case is still pending before the district court and thus is not yet final.

Appeal Injunction Order: In addition to the final-judgment timing, a party has a right to appeal an injunction related orders.  28 USC 1292(a)(1).  The statute is written quite broadly to include orders “granting, continuing, modifying, refusing or dissolving injunctions, or refusing to dissolve or modify injunctions.” 28 USC 1292(a)(1).  Notably, however, the statute does not expressly call-out contempt orders for violation of an injunction.

Here, Shure argued that Judge Chang had modified the preliminary injunction in the contempt order by enjoining all sales of Shure’s MXA910-A.  The appellate court disagreed. Although that particular product was not particularly named in the contempt order, it is a colorable imitation of the named MXA910 and fits within the injunction’s language of being “capable of being installed in a drop-ceiling” configuration.

With no right to appeal, the appellate court dismissed the case. “[W]e have no jurisdiction over this interlocutory appeal.”  The court explained that Shure should have appealed the preliminary injunction order itself. Of course, that deadline is in the rear view camera.

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ClearOne’s sanctions motion argues that Shure’s appeal was frivolous and seeks “just damages” as permitted by FRAP 38.  Here, in particular, the court has previously ruled (repeatedly) that an order interpreting an injunction is not immediately appealable. Sanctions Motion ClearOne.

The Senate has confirmed Tiffany Cunningham, President Biden’s first pick for the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.  Judge Cunningham is expected to be sworn in this week and immediately step into her new role (although the court typically slows down during August).  Judge Cunningham will be the first African American judge on the Federal Circuit. The vote was bipartisan, although 33 republicans voted NO, including my two senators (Josh Hawley and Roy Blunt).

by Dennis Crouch

If affirmances by the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) are any guide, patent examiners appear to now have a good handle on applying the PTAB eligibility examination guidance.  I looked at  PTAB patent eligibility decisions from the past month and found that examiner eligibility rejections were affirmed in 92% of cases (55 of 60 decisions). There were also five cases where the PTAB added eligibility as a new ground for rejection.

92% affirmance for eligibility issues is quite high compared to other issues being appealed.  So far in FY2021, the PTAB is fully affirming examiner decisions in only 56% of cases and partially affirming in an addition 10%.

The PTAB’s general approach is to follow the USPTO’s eligibility examination guidance and then supplement that approach with Federal Circuit and Supreme Court cases.  Most often, the PTAB is able to draw a direct analogy with a prior appellate decision.

The following are three recent affirmances:

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Ex Parte Ausubel, Appeal No. 2021-000765, 2021 WL 2982136 (PTAB)

Lawrence Ausubel is a Professor of Economics at Maryland and has published dozens of articles on efficient auction design and holds several patents. His pending patent application claims a computer-implemented system for allowing smaller-quantity intra-round bidding during a “clock auction.”

The examiner rejected the claims as directed to a fundamental economic practice rather than a practical invention and that, absent the computer limitations, the method is a mental process (with pencil + paper). On appeal though the PTAB affirmed:

Hedging risk is a fundamental economic practice. … Here, claim 1 seeks to hedge risk in a clock auction by using intra-round bids with generic computers and components that perform generic data processing of sending and receiving data to auction securities, contracts, commodities, spectra, and other items.

The Board’s analysis directly analogized to Bilski’s patent application which the Supreme Court rejected.

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Ex parte Knoll, Appeal No. 2021-000035, 2021 WL 3015118 (PTAB) (Philips Medizin)

The invention here is directed to a method of approximating a patient’s pulse-wave using the pressure signal from a blood pressure cuff.  The claims require receipt of repeated measurement of pulse-curves as the clamp pressure changes.  Those curves are weighted and combined to create the approximated pulse wave.  The examiner rejected the claims as directed toward ineligible abstract idea.   On appeal, the PTAB has affirmed, finding the claims directed to a series of mathematical calculations based upon selected information.  Further, the fact that data is received from a blood-pressure cuff does not transform the idea into a patent eligible practical application.

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Ex Parte Tazono, Appeal No. 2021-000816, 2021 WL 3015120 (PTAB) (Alpine Electronics).

Tazano’s application is directed to methods of acquiring and presenting information about upcoming events.  The PTAB affirmed the examiner rejection — finding the claims directed to the abstract idea of organizing human activities.  Further, the claims rely only upon generic computer technology and do not “recite an improvement to a particular computer technology. . . . All purported inventive aspects reside in how the data is interpreted and the results desired, and not in how the process physically enforces such a data interpretation or in how the processing technologically achieves those results.”

by Dennis Crouch

BOT M8 v. Sony (Fed. Cir. 2021)

Pleading Standards: The starting point of a civil lawsuit is the filing of the complaint that makes a claim for relief.  FRCP 3.  In order to properly state a claim, the rules require “a short and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to relief.” FRCP 8.  For many years, the rules included an Appendix of Form Complaints deemed legally sufficient to satisfy R. 8. Form 18 focused on patent infringement and included a bare-bones set of allegations that (1) the plaintiff owns a particular patent and (2) the defendant has infringed that patent. (Image of Form 18 below).   In general, Form 18 was plaintiff friendly, making it easy to file a patent infringement lawsuit without providing any details beyond the patent number at issue.  That approach was in place for a number of years and only began to crumble with the Supreme Court’s decision in  Bell v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544 (2007), followed by Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662 (2009).  Those cases interpreted the “short and plain statement” requirement as requiring “facial plausibility” that can be satisfied by the inclusion of factual allegations that lead to a reasonable inference of liability.  Still, even after Iqbal, the form-pleading-sufficiency rule was still in place in a way that forestalled complete implementation of the Iqbal regime. In 2015, Form 18 was removed and the transformation complete.

Element-by-Element Claim Analysis in Pleadings: Post-Iqbal, the courts have struggled with line-drawing-what quality of factual allegations are sufficient to survive the plausibility test.  In patent cases, one question is whether then plaintiff needs to provide an element-by-element analysis of how the accused activity practices each element of the asserted claims.   Here, the Federal Circuit holds (again) that element-by-element analysis is not a pleading requirement:

To the extent this district court and others have adopted a blanket element-by-element pleading standard for patent infringement, that approach is unsupported and goes beyond the standard the Supreme Court articulated in Iqbal and Twombly.

Slip Op.

In Bot M8 v. Sony, the district court dismissed Bot M8’s infringement claims against Sony’s PlayStation 4 (PS4). (Dismissing claims stemming from four patents).   On appeal, the Federal Circuit has reversed-in-part.  While plausibility is required, the court repeated its prior statement that the plaintiff “need not prove its case at the pleading stage.” Bill of Lading (Fed. Cir. 2012).

Regarding infringement, the court found that a complaint may be sufficient without an element-by-element infringement analysis. “A plaintiff is not required to plead infringement on an element-by-element basis.”  Rather, the focus of complaint sufficiency is notice — a complaint needs to provide fair notice of what activities by the defendant constitute infringement.

The court then tried to draw some lines:

• Insufficient: merely alleging an entitlement to relief (as was done in Form 18)
• Insufficient: reciting claim elements and “merely concluding that the accused product has those elements.”
• Sufficient: providing factual allegations that, when taken as true, articulate why it is plausible that the accused product infringes.

Again, the focus is on fair notice to the defendant and “specific facts are not necessary” when the general allegations are sufficient.

Although the district court required too much by demanding element-by-element analysis in the complaint, the Federal Circuit still affirmed the dismissal with regard to two of the four patents.  For those two patents, the court concluded that allegations found in the complaint actually disprove infringement.  The complaint “contains too much rather than too little, to the point that Bot M8 has essentially pleaded itself out of court.”  In particular, Bot M8 alleges that the “authentication program” is stored on the motherboard, but the claims require the program to be stored on a separate board. “That allegation renders Bot M8’s infringement claim not even possible, much less plausible. While claim 1 requires that the game program and authentication program be stored together, separately from the motherboard, the [complaint] alleges that the authentication program is located on the PS4 motherboard itself.”

The conclusion here warns against a “kitchen sink” approach to infringement assertions within a patent complaint. In particular, patentees will need to be cautious when alleging infringement of alternative claim language such as below.

1. A system comprising an authentication program stored in a first memory and a motherboard…
2. The system of claim 1 where the first memory is located on the motherboard.
3. The system of claim 1 where the first memory is not located on the motherboard.

Barring unusual claim construction, an accused system cannot infringe both claims 2 and 3 since they are claimed in the alternative.  It turns out that you might not know at the time of filing the exact location of the motherboard.  Although some amount of pre-filing investigation is required, the rules allow for plaintiffs to rely upon  potential discoverable evidence when making the complaint. In Bot M8, plaintiff’s counsel argued that it “had not previously reverse engineered the PS4 to support the prior pleadings because ‘jailbreaking’ the PS4 is illegal under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (“DMCA”) and other anti-hacking statutes.”  In this particular case, the district court did not rule on the merits of the of the excuse, but ruled that that the concern had been raised too late in the litigation to be viable. “Because Bot M8 did not raise any concerns about its ability to reverse engineer the PS4 until after the district court issued its decision on Sony’s motion to dismiss, the court found that Bot M8 was not diligent.”

An easy solution here is to “plead in the alternative.” The FRCP permits parties to set out two different statements of a claim “alternatively or hypothetically . . . A party may state as many separate claims or defenses as it has, regardless of consistency.” FRCP 8(d).  One difficulty though is that each alternative pathway must meet the plausibility standard. The difficulty for Bot M8 is that it did not plead in the alternative. “Notably, Bot M8’s allegations were not pled in the alternative.” Slip Op. at Note 3.  Rather, Bot M8 told one story that effectively disproved infringement for two of the asserted patents.

= = = =

Claim 1 of another asserted patent had also been determined invalid as ineligible. On appeal, the Federal Circuit affirmed that the asserted claim 1 “recites the abstract idea of increasing or decreasing the risk-to-reward ratio, or more broadly the difficulty, of a multiplayer game based upon previous aggregate results. But the claim leaves open how to accomplish this, and the specification provides hardly any more direction.”  Slip Op. (quoting district court and affirming on the same reasoning).

= = = =

• US 8,078,540: Dismissal affirmed, claims contradict factual assertions in claim (memory location)
• US 8,095,990: Dismissal affirmed, claims contradict factual assertions in claim (memory location)
• US 7,664,988: Dismissal reversed, element-by-element infringement analysis not required in the complaint.
• US 8,112,670: Dismissal reversed, element-by-element infringement analysis not required in the complaint.
• US 7,338,363: Dismissal affirmed, claims lack eligibility.

Interesting pending civil action in Grupo Bimbo v. Hirshfeld (E.D.Va. 2021).

The Mexican company Grupo Bimbo makes more bread than any other company — including Wonder Bread and Sara Lee brands in the USA.  Bimbo is attempting to register a mark for its “ARTESANO” line of bread — after apparently selling more than $1 billion in pre-packaged sliced bread product.

The PTO found that “Artisan Bread” is a generic term, and that consumers will translate the Spanish word “ARTESANO” to its English equivalent when purchasing.

In this appeal, the resemblance between ARTESANO and the word “Artisan” is so evident in both sound and appearance that the average American consumer will automatically translate ARTESANO and equate ARTESANO and the word “artisan.”

Bimbo has now filed a civil action under 15 U.S.C. 1071(b) seeking a declaration from the District Court that its mark is not generic but instead is distinctive.

Bimbo Complaint.

Ex parte Zhang, Reexam No. 90/014,234, 2021 WL 633718 (PTAB)

Folks continue to file anonymous ex parte reexaminations.  Michael Piper of Conley Rose filed this one on behalf of an anonymous party challenging Zhang’s U.S. Design Patent No. D810,925 (“breast pump”).   The reexamination examiner agreed with the challenge and issued a final rejection that the claimed design was anticipated by four different prior art references.  Note that design patent anticipation asks whether the design to be patented is “substantially the same” as the prior art in the eyes of an ordinary observer.

Two designs are substantially the same if their resemblance is deceptive to the extent that it would induce an ordinary observer, giving such attention as a purchaser usually gives, to purchase an article having one design supposing it to be the other.

Door-Master Corp. v. Yorktowne Inc., 256 F.3d 1308 (Fed. Cir. 2001) (citing Gorham Co. v. White, 81 U.S. 511 (1871)).

Not Prior Art: On appeal, the PTAB has reversed — finding that cited references are not prior art at all.

First to Disclose: Two of the references were Chinese Design Registrations filed and published a couple of months before Zhang’s filing date.  Prior to that date, but still within one-year, Zhang had already licensed the design and licensed pumps embodying the patented design were on sale in China. The timing of this prior public disclosure was just right to save the day under Section 102(b)(1)(B).

(b)(1) A disclosure made 1 year or less before the effective filing date of a claimed invention shall not be prior art to the claimed invention under subsection (a)(1) if—(B) the subject matter disclosed had, before such disclosure, been publicly disclosed by the inventor … or another who obtained the subject matter disclosed directly or indirectly from the inventor or a joint inventor.

Zhang apparently did not make this argument until the appeal, and, the examiner withdrew his rejection after receiving the declaration with supporting evidence.

The other two references were internet publications purportedly published online two-years before Zhang’s application filing date.  However, the PTAB found insufficient evidence proving their publication dates.

Here, an anonymous third party, through counsel, provided the USPTO with copies of two webpages in a foreign language … each paired with an uncertified English translation. Both documents and translations were submitted by a third party requester in a very unclear, grainy or pixelated manner and the text and details over the figures are very difficult to discern.

The submitted material do include printed dates, but the PTAB found them unclear and insufficient without any corroborating evidence regarding context or accuracy. Further, no evidence was submitted showing that the sites were publicly accessible as of those dates, and the pages are no longer available on the internet.

There is simply no explanation or verification of the source, date or accessibility of the information presented on these documents. While we can put some weight in the duty of a signatory of a registered patent attorney in accordance with 37 C.F.R. § 11.18 that statements of fact are “believed to be true,” we simply cannot find the evidence sufficient to establish the documents as prior art.

Zhang.  Thus, the PTAB reversed the rejection.