Posts Tagged: "reasonable expectation of success"

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in a precedential decision yesterday affirmed a Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) decision that Teva Pharmaceuticals had failed to prove Corcept Therapuetics’ U.S. Patent No. 10,195,214 would have been obvious. The patent covers methods of treating Cushing’s syndrome, a disease caused by excessive levels of the naturally occurring steroid hormone, cortisol. Chief Judge Moore authored the opinion.

On November 4, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) reversed a decision by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office’s Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) that University of Strathclyde’s patent claims for a method for photoinactivating antibiotic-resistant bacteria without using a photosensitizing agent were unpatentable. The PTAB held claims one, two, three, and four of U.S. Patent No. 9,839,706 (‘706 patent) were obvious based on the prior art. The court held the PTAB’s findings were not based on substantial evidence.

On January 27, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) affirmed in-part and vacated in-part a decision of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) in its inter partes review of claims 1—20 of U.S. Patent No. 8,370,106 (the ‘106 patent) assigned to KEYnetik, Inc. (KEYnetik). Judge O’Malley concurred in part and dissented in part. In particular, the CAFC concluded that the PTAB did not err in its claim construction regarding an orientation detection limitation and a sequence limitation. Further, the CAFC affirmed the PTAB’s decision that the Petitioner’s references could be combined. However, the CAFC also found that the PTAB failed to properly assess the appellant’s argument regarding a reasonable expectation of success when combining references and therefore vacated the decision and remanded the case so that the Board could make such a determination.