Posts in Federal Circuit

Why have claims if the claims don’t matter. Essentially Judge Lourie, and the Canadian Patent Office too, are saying ignore the claims and read the specification to determine what the innovation is and then without regard to the language of the claims make your determination. Under this viewpoint claims are simply irrelevant. Yet we know that claims are not irrelevant, and such a view is directly contrary to the Patent Act itself. Ignoring claims is utterly ridiculous given inventions are not patentable. Patent claims are supposed to be evaluating NOT the entirety of the invention. The sine quo non of patents are the claims. It is black letter law that the claims define the exclusive right granted. Ignoring the claims shows reckless disregard for the well established law and is nothing short of judicial activism.

The first thing that any student of the Federal Circuit likely notices when reading CLS Bank is that Judge Lourie not only joined the dominant concurrence, but he also wrote the opinion. The same Judge Lourie who wrote the first opinion in Mayo, after which the Supreme Court asked the Federal Circuit to reconsider, and who then wrote the second opinion in Mayo. The same Judge Lourie who wrote the first opinion in Myriad, after which the Supreme Court asked the Federal Circuit to reconsider, and who then wrote the second opinion in Myriad[12]. All of those opinions interpret §101 broadly. What changed?

All the Judges rely on the same Supreme Court precedents in Gottschalk v Benson, Parker v. Flook, Diamond v. Diehr, Bilski v. Kappos, and Mayo v. Prometheus. All the Judges recognize the same judicial exception to statutory subject matter under §101 for laws of nature, natural phenomena, and abstract ideas. All the Judges recognize that a claim must include “meaningful limitations” that go beyond an abstract idea. Hollow field-of-use limitations and insignificant pre or post-solution activity don’t count. However, this is where their similarities end.

While the Supreme Court has done away with the “useful, concrete and tangible result” test from State Street Bank v. Signature Financial, in Bilski v. Kappos, 8 out of 9 Justices (i.e., everyone except Justice Scalia) signed onto an opinion that recognized that the patent claims in State Street displayed patent eligible subject matter. Indeed, the dissenters in Bilski specifically acknowledged that the claims at issue in State Street did not deal with processes, but dealt with machines. See Footnote 40 of the Steven’s dissent. The import of this is that machines are specifically patent eligible subject matter, so if the claims of State Street are to machines then claims that are similarly configured would also be directed to machines and therefore patent eligible.

Watson? It is an artificially intelligent computer system that is capable of answering questions presented in natural language. It is, in essence, the modern day equivalent to the all knowing Star Trek computer. It is flat out ridiculous to be asking whether the Star Trek omnipotent computer could be patent eligible, that that is where we find ourselves because what makes the computer unique is the software that makes it possible for Watson to perform 80 trillion operations per second. But Federal Circuit Judges say that mere fact that software is fast doesn’t make it patent eligible unless there is some kind of uniqueness to the computer itself. Have we really reached the point where truly astonishing innovations, innovations once thought to be impossible, are not patent eligible? Talk about jumping the shark!

Perpetuating the myth that the computer is where the magic lies does nothing other than ignore reality. Software is what makes everything happen. or crying out loud, software drives a multitude of machines! Maybe the auto mechanic for Judges Judges Lourie, Dyk, Prost, Reyna and Wallach should remove the software from their cars. Perhaps as they are stranded and forced to walk to work they might have time to contemplate the world they seem to want to force upon the rest of us; a world hat clings to mechanical machines completely non-reliant on software. That will be great for the economy!

The only thing we know is this — the Federal Circuit issued an extraordinarily brief per curiam decision, which stated: “Upon consideration en banc, a majority of the court affirms the district court’s holding that the asserted method and computer-readable media claims are not directed to eligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101. An equally divided court affirms the district court’s holding that the asserted system claims are not directed to eligible subject matter under that statute.” Thus, the asserted claims are not patent eligible.

Where the Federal Circuit is reviewing a validity decision from the district courts, the Federal Circuit reviews the claim construction de novo. The Federal Circuit also chooses not the most likely meaning, but the broadest reasonable meaning for disputed claim language. That is, the claim construction most likely to invalidate the claim in question. Now, we ask whether the same fate is likely to befall claims that are being asserted in a patent infringement action. Asked differently, does the Federal Circuit choose the claim construction most likely to lead to a conclusion of no infringement? Saffran v. Johnson & Johnson seems to suggest that the answer is sadly, yes.

“Carve outs” essentially involve a situation where there is an FDA approved drug for which the generic drug maker seeks to market that drug, again through an Abbreviated New Drug Application (ANDA), but instead for an FDA approved use, where also that FDA approved use is unpatented. While these “carve outs” also involve the filing of a Paragraph IV Certification, there is a slight but important twist in that Certification: inclusion of what is called a “section viii statement” that the generic drug maker “is not seeking approval for a method of use that is claimed in the patent.” When submitting the “section viii statement,” the generic drug maker must also provide a proposed label that removes or “carves out” the claimed method of use.

In a moment of extreme weakness, I agreed to Gene’s request to doing a primer on Paragraph IV Certifications under the Drug Price Competition and Patent Term Restoration Act, commonly referred to as Hatch-Waxman. I don’t know if you would call me an expert, but I’ve studied many, many cases involving Paragraph IV Certifications under Hatch-Waxman. The courts have found Hatch-Waxman to be a hydra-like monster with a labyrinth of sections that are frequently confusing (or worse yet, conflicting). Paragraph IV Certifications are a particular trouble spot in Hatch-Waxman. So if you’re up to diving into the “belly of this beast,” let’s examine the characteristics of this most infamous of the Hatch-Waxman monsters. To understand Paragraph IV Certifications, you must first address what an Abbreviated New Drug Application (ANDA) is. ANDAs are how generic drug manufactures expedite the approval of their generic drugs.

Patent litigants have long expected an appeal to follow nearly every jury verdict and that a key question (if not the key question) on appeal will be the district court’s construction of one or more disputed claim terms. Syntrix’s recent infringement verdict against Illumina would be seen as no exception if not for what happened the very next day — the Federal Circuit’s decision to rehear en banc the panel’s decision in Lighting Ballast Control LLC v. Philips Electronics N. Am. Corp. to consider whether to reset the standard of review for claim construction, long recognized as a question of law reviewed de novo on appeal.

Federal Circuit Chief Judge Rader recently delivered an important and noteworthy defense of the U.S. patent system the recent annual meeting of the Association of University Technology Managers (AUTM). His ideas have merit, but let’s not presume that patent litigation reform is all that is needed or all that can be done to help. I believe that Chief Judge Rader and other patent system users should focus on additional reforms that could contribute in a substantive way.

Rader: “I come from the commercial law area where to tell the CEO that “well I’m going to have to balance several factors and ask three courts over a period three years whether or not you can have this product enter the market” is simply an inadequate response. In the commercial area we have to have a predictable, yes or I will use the B word — a Bright line rule. Now, that’s lead to kind of this culture clash where the Supreme Court says there needs to be more balancing and flexibility. The formalism of the Federal Circuit is uncomfortable to [the Supreme Court]. But that’s a function of our legal culture. I think perhaps the answer is the Federal Circuit needs to gain a little bit more flexibility from its experience with the Supreme Court, but I hope the Supreme Court also recognizes that the Federal Circuit is reaching its decisions for well considered reasons.”

Hubbell argued that obviousness-type double patenting is not appropriate where the application and the conflicting claim (1) share common inventors but do not have identical inventive entities, (2) were never commonly owned, and (3) are not subject to a joint research agreement. The Patent Office countered that: (1) whether the application and patent were ever commonly owned is immaterial to the policy of preventing harassment by multiple assignees; (2) identity of inventorship is not required where there is an overlap in inventors; (3) Hubbell did not establish any grounds for being allowed to file a terminal disclaimer; and (4) two-way obviousness analysis is not required because Hubbell admitted that he partially is responsible for the delay that caused the ’685 patent claims to issue first. The CAFC agreed with the Patent Office on each point.

In this final segment of the interview, which appears below, we move into the issues of the day: the changing patent laws and Supreme Court interest in patents. We also discuss Judge Linn’s decision to take senior status, the fact that he won’t be able to sit en banc unless he was on the original panel, and the Judge’s idea that only few cases really should be designated as precedential opinions.