The U.S. Supreme Court has been asked to grant certiorari to resolve whether the Defend Trade Secrets Act (DTSA) permits an unjust enrichment award without any showing of actual loss resulting from the defendant’s misappropriation of trade secrets. The defendant in Tata Consultancy Services Ltd. v. Computer Sciences Corp. has petitioned for certiorari, arguing that actual loss is a prerequisite for an unjust enrichment award. The petition challenges a Fifth Circuit decision affirming a $56 million unjust enrichment award and a $112 million punitive award in favor of Computer Sciences Corp. (“CSC”), measured by the costs Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) avoided through its trade secret theft rather than by any proven actual loss to CSC.

On Tuesday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit issued a published opinion in Malone v. U.S. Patent and Trademark Office affirming the Eastern District of Virginia’s grant of summary judgment to the USPTO after finding that the agency properly withheld documents sought by US Inventor’s Josh Malone pursuant to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request related to administrative patent judge (APJ) paneling at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB). The Fourth Circuit found that decision drafts circulated to nonpanel APJs were subject to FOIA’s exemption for predecisional and deliberative documents and were not unprotected ex parte communications.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) issued a decision today in DK Crown Holdings Inc. v. AG 18, LLC, affirming a final written decision of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) and holding that DK Crown Holdings Inc., formerly known as DraftKings, Inc. (DK), failed to prove that claim 18 of U.S. Patent No. 9,978,205 was unpatentable during inter partes review (IPR).

On Tuesday, May 5, Representative Jamie Raskin (D-MD), Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Committee, sent a letter to U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) Director John Squires pressing him to answer questions about the Office’s role in filing a trademark application on behalf of the Trump Administration for Trump’s “Board of Peace.”

In its recent petition to the U.S. Supreme Court, Google argues that patents can be invalid at any time, even decades after issuance, and therefore should remain open to inter partes review (IPR) challenges, regardless of age or how long they have been relied upon. At first glance, this sounds like a defense of patent quality. Coming from one of the most frequent users of the Patent Trial and Appeal board (PTAB) over the past decade — and arriving just as the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office’s (USPTO’s) “settled expectations” doctrine begins to limit late-stage IPR challenges — it raises a sharper question: why now?

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) issued a decision today in TJTM Technologies, LLC v. Google LLC, affirming the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California’s dismissal of a patent infringement lawsuit and holding that the asserted patent claims are directed to patent-ineligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101. The nonprecedential decision was authored by Judge Chen and joined by Judges Dyk and Stark.

A person recently approached me at church with excitement regarding a software process he developed. His company was so pleased with the result that it is filing a patent, listing him as the inventor. This person knew that I had some kind of patent backstory, so he asked for my thoughts. My name is Jeffrey A. Killian, and I am the patent applicant in the Federal Circuit Court case # 2021 -2113 (In Re: Killian). I took no pleasure in telling my  friend at church that his patent application will be rejected. Plus, the official notice will have my precedential case quoted all over his rejection. With friends at church like me, who needs enemies? 

Trademark claims against Netflix concerning its popular “Running Point” comedy series were recently dismissed at the pleadings stage due to a one-letter misarticulation of applicable First Amendment law. The case, soon to be litigated on appeal, highlights the need to clarify the contours of trademark liability arising from creative works. Pepperdine University filed the lawsuit last year against Netflix and co-defendants Warner Bros. and Kaling International, just one week before the “Running Point” series premiere.  Loosely based on the life of Los Angeles Lakers owner Jeanie Buss, the series stars Kate Hudson as the owner of the fictional basketball team the Los Angeles Waves. The popular series, which amassed instant popularity and ranked as Netflix’s #1 TV show, was quickly ordered for a second season that premiered April 23, 2026.

This week on IPWatchdog Unleashed, I spoke with Brent Bellows, a partner with Knowles Intellectual Property Strategies (KIPS). We discussed a variety of issues including Hatch-Waxman, Orange Book listings, paragraph IV certifications, skinny labels, generic entry, clinical trial costs, regulatory exclusivity, and the enormous financial risk associated with bringing new drugs to market. Gene and Brent explore the tension between public demand for lower drug prices and the need for durable incentives that make high-risk drug development economically viable, particularly for oncology, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, antibiotic resistant bacteria, and other difficult-to-treat conditions. The episode closes with a broader innovation-policy message: patents are not a peripheral feature of drug development—they are a core operating asset that enables private-sector investment, supports breakthrough therapies, and ultimately drives the availability of future generic medicines.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) on Monday in a precedential decision authored by Judge Lourie affirmed a district court’s ruling determining certain claims of Enviro Tech Chemical Services, Inc.’s patent for a method of poultry treatment indefinite. Enviro Tech’s U.S. Patent No.10,912,321is titled “Methods of Using Peracetic Acid to Treat Poultry in a Chill Tank During Processing.” Enviro Tech sued Safe Foods Corp. for infringement of a number of claims of the patent in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas.

On April 30, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) released this year’s Special 301 Report, which surveys the effectiveness of intellectual property (IP) rights and enforcement abroad and identifies foreign nations where IP protections are uncertain or disregarded. The 2026 report marks the first time in 13 years that a Priority Foreign Country (PFC) has been named, with Vietnam being identified as a PFC for persistent failures to address several long-standing IP concerns. The USTR has also added the European Union (EU) to the Special 301 Report’s Watch List, the first time since 2006 that the continental government has been identified for IP-related concerns in addition to individual European nations.

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) issued a significant Decision on Remand on Monday, April 27, 2026, clarifying when estoppel under 35 U.S.C. § 315(e)(1) attaches and—critically—what it means to “request” a proceeding “before the Office.” The ruling arises from an increasingly common set of circumstances—HID had initially filed an inter partes review (IPR) against CPC Patent Technologies’ U.S. Patent No. 9,665,705, and subsequently requested ex parte reexamination requests of that same patent. Monday’s decision clarifies that a party is estopped from “requesting” ex parte reexam at the moment the IPR final written decision issues when the USPTO has yet to order ex parte reexam.

This week in Other Barks & Bites: the U.S. Trade Representative issues its annual Special 301 Report listing the European Union as a Watch List nation for IP-related issues; Senators Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Maria Cantwell (D-WA) publicly oppose the Trump Administration’s decisions to cut federal funding for science and upend the National Science Board; and more.

The University of North Carolina at Charlotte brought together leaders from government, academia, industry, and the defense community for its 2026 Invention of the Year Awards, an evening that showcased the university’s growing role as a national engine of innovation, commercialization, and technological impact.

Whether or not the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) wants to admit it, over most of the last generation there has been a secret examination docket. Not surprisingly, such a secret examination docket is strictly prohibited by federal law. A newly filed joint status report in Morinville v. USPTO brings this issue to the fore and underscores the lack of transparency and accountability of secret internal patent review programs at the USPTO. Procedurally, the latest filing seeks to expose the USPTO shadow docket through a new round of discovery, which is currently being considered by the United States District Court for the District of Columbia.