Brandon Reed

The United States Court of Appeal for the Federal Circuit recently upheld the Central District of California’s ruling of summary judgment that certain accused products of Foundation Constructors, Inc. and Foundation Pile, Inc. (Foundation) do not infringe certain claims of U.S. Patent Nos. 7,914,236 (the ’236 patent) and 9,284,708 (the ’708 patent) (collectively, the patents-in-suit) after plaintiffs-appellants Steve Neville, Substructure Support, Inc., and TDP Support, Inc. (collectively, Substructure) appealed the district court’s ruling, as based on an improper claim construction. See Neville v. Found. Constructors, Inc., No. 2020-1132, 2020 U.S. App. LEXIS 27321 (Fed. Cir. Aug. 27, 2020) (Before Lourie, O’Malley, and Chen, Circuit Judges) (Opinion for the Court, Chen, Circuit Judge).

Recently, the Federal Circuit affirmed a decision of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, holding that the Board correctly determined that the claims 21–24 of U.S. Patent No. 6,754,640 (’640 patent) and claims 1-20 of U.S. Patent 8,768,840 (’840 patent), both owned by Bozeman Financial LLC (Bozeman), are directed to patent ineligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101. To reach this decision, the Federal Circuit first determined the appellees, all 12 of the United States Federal Reserve Banks (Banks), to be “persons” under the America Invents Act (AIA) and, therefore, eligible to petition for post-issuance review under the AIA. See Bozeman Fin. LLC v. Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, No. 2019-1018, 2020 U.S. App. LEXIS 11315 (Fed. Cir. April 10, 2020) (Before Lourie, Dyk, and Moore, Circuit Judges) (Opinion for the Court, Moore, Circuit Judge).