The Federal Circuit’s Rigid Approach to Secondary Considerations

by Dennis Crouch

Purdue Pharma has filed a petition for certiorari asking the Supreme Court to review what it characterizes as the Federal Circuit's overly rigid application of the "nexus" requirement for objective indicia of non-obviousness. I agree with the petition that the Federal Circuit's approach contradicts the Supreme Court's longstanding precedent requiring a flexible and expansive analysis of obviousness factors, exemplified both by the court's 2007 KSR decision as well as older cases, such as Minerals Separation v. Hyde, 242 U.S. 261 (1916).


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