Posts in Federal Circuit

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday denied certiorari to review a February ruling of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) that held claims of ChromaDex, Inc.’s patent on an isolated form of vitamin B3 are directed to unpatentable subject matter under Section 101. The CAFC affirmed the Delaware district court’s grant of summary judgment for Elysium Health that the relevant claims of U.S. Patent No. 8,197,807, titled “Nicotinamide riboside kinase compositions and methods for using the same,” were invalid under Section 101 as being directed to a natural phenomenon, specifically, “compositions comprising isolated [NR], a naturally occurring vitamin present in cow milk.”

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) ruled on Monday that the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California erred in granting judgment as a matter of law (JMOL) that the relevant claims of Cyntec Company, Ltd.’s patents were not invalid as obvious and in denying Chilisin Electronics Corp.’s Daubert motion to exclude testimony from Cyntec’s damages expert. However, it affirmed the district court’s judgment of infringement.

On October 16, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) issued a precedential decision in Corephotonics, Ltd. v. Apple Inc. affirming most of a final written decision by the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) that invalidated dual-aperture camera system patents owned by Corephotonics. The Federal Circuit nixed the patent owner’s arguments that asserted prior art references were not analogous art but remanded to the PTAB for further explanation of its ruling, as the Board may have misconstrued the pertinent problem addressed by one reference.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) issued a precedential decision on Friday vacating-in-part a district court decision that granted SonicWall, Inc. summary judgment of invalidity based on a collateral estoppel decision that the CAFC had since vacated. Judge Bryson concurred in part and dissented in part, disagreeing with the majority’s analysis affirming the district court’s grant of summary judgment of noninfringement as to the claims of certain patents.

On October 10, the U.S. Supreme Court issued an order list showing it had denied the petition for writ of certiorari filed in Personalized Media Communication, LLC v. Apple Inc. In denying the appeal, SCOTUS leaves in place a divided Federal Circuit ruling that improperly expanded prosecution laches doctrine according to Personalized Media (PMC). The cert denial also passes on the question of whether prosecution laches remains a valid defense to patent infringement in light of the Supreme Court’s 2017 ruling in SCA Hygiene Products v. First Quality Baby Products.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) on Tuesday, October 10, affirmed a district court’s dismissal at the pleading stage of a patent infringement, unjust enrichment and antitrust case against Qualcomm, Inc. Larry Golden sued Qualcomm in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, alleging infringement of his patents on a system for locking, unlocking or disabling locks on vehicles upon detection of chemical or biological hazards, as well as antitrust and unjust enrichment claims.

On October 5, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) heard oral arguments in VLSI Technology LLC v. Intel Corporation, an appeal following the massive $2.175 billion damages verdict handed by a Western Texas jury in March 2021 to VLSI for Intel’s infringement of two computer processor patents. The Federal Circuit judicial panel hearing the appeal drilled down on the sufficiency of VLSI’s expert testimony for establishing infringement under the doctrine of equivalents, as well as damages calculations that arguably relied upon data from non-infringing features of the accused technology.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) today denied a petition for writ of mandamus filed by Realtek Semiconductor Corporation seeking to direct the International Trade Commission (ITC) to vacate its ruling granting Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (AMD)’s motion to strike Realtek’s witness from testifying at an upcoming evidentiary hearing.

Friends and former colleagues: If one of the members of our judicial “family” suffers some kind of health event, our first action should be to rush to help. Kindness and brother/sisterhood requires no less. If I can recall some history on our circuit, when Dan Friedman or Giles Rich or others were suffering from declining health, we rushed as their friends and colleagues to offer help, support, and comfort. As Chief Judge, I visited Dan in the hospital once or twice a week for months and then reached out to other colleagues to ensure someone visited him every day. By the way, the most willing participant in our court support network was Judge Polly Newman.

Just two days after hundreds in the intellectual property community stood for U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) Judge Pauline Newman following her thoughtfully delivered words at IPWatchdog LIVE 2023, the CAFC’s Judicial Council released a 375-page Order suspending Judge Newman from all cases. The Council also released a slew of other documents today, including Newman’s August 31 response to the initial recommendation that she be suspended.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) today affirmed a district court’s grant of summary judgment that Baxalta, Inc. and Baxalta GmbH’s Hemophilia patent claims are invalid for a lack of enablement. The court said the facts of the case are “materially indistinguishable from those in Amgen.”… While Baxalta tried to argue its screening process does not require the type of trial and error described in Amgen and instead “predictably and reliably generates new claimed antibodies every time it is performed,” the court said “this does not take the process out of the realm of the trial-and-error approaches rejected in Amgen.”

Amici have submitted briefs and a response has been filed in recent weeks with respect to U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) Director Kathi Vidal’s petition to the U.S. Supreme Court for review of a decision that said the USPTO was wrong to reject a trademark application for the mark TRUMP TOO SMALL. The February decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) held the Office’s application of Section 2(c) of the Lanham Act to reject TRUMP TOO SMALL was unconstitutional. Specifically, the CAFC panel held that “applying section 2(c) to bar registration of [Steve] Elster’s mark unconstitutionally restricts free speech in violation of the First Amendment.”

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) today issued two precedential opinions vacating and remanding decisions of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB). In the first, the court said the PTAB abused its discretion in finding that Netflix, Inc. failed to articulate a field of endeavor to establish analogous art, vacating the Board’s decision in part. In the second, the CAFC vacated the PTAB’s finding that Apple, Inc. had failed to prove Corephotonics’ patent claims unpatentable as obvious, holding that the evidence supported a different claim construction than that adopted by the Board in one decision, and because the Board’s decision in the second inter partes review (IPR) violated the Administrative Procedure Act (APA).

The New Civil Liberties Alliance (NCLA), which is representing Judge Pauline Newman in her case against U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) Chief Judge Moore and the Special Committee of the Judicial Council that is investigating Newman, today released a forensic psychologist’s report on Newman’s mental fitness and a video detailing the alleged unjust treatment Newman has received. The press release and report come days after the three-judge panel that comprises the Special Committee told the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia that the federal judiciary was meant to police itself, and that Newman’s claim that the Judicial Conduct and Disability Act of 1980 is unconstitutional should be dismissed.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) issued an order on Tuesday denying Charter Communications Inc.’s petition for a writ of mandamus seeking to direct the district court to dismiss Entropic Communications’ patent infringement suit against it for improper venue. Entropic sued Charter in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, alleging patent infringement, and Charter moved to dismiss for improper venue. The district court denied the motion, holding that Charter “committed acts of infringement and has a regular and established place of business” in the district.