Several interesting recent decisions at the PTAB exhibit a “man bites dog” pattern in which the patent owner has succeeded in disqualifying the petitioner’s evidence of prior art, and saved patent claims as a result. These decisions reflect the limited discovery allowed by the PTAB to meet its tight deadlines. Although ambiguity about prior art might be resolved in discovery at district court, the PTAB generally requires evidence of prior art to be meticulously substantiated in the petition for an AIA review.
These cases, including Blue Calypso v. Groupon and GoPro v. Contour IP, expand the edges of existing case law on the use of Internet-based and printed prior art regarding public accessibility to those skilled in the art. Moreover, in a recent post-grant review (PGR) Altaire Pharmaceuticals v. Paragon Bioteck, the first time the PTAB upheld a patent in a PGR, the patent survived because the petitioner failed to prove that the claims were invalid due to public use or on-sale activity. Altaire asserted that earlier sales of its own eye solution product had made Paragon’s invention obvious, but failed to conform to PTAB rules about experimental testing.
Speakers:
- David Conrad, Fish & Richardson PC
- Brian Mudge, Andrews Kurth Kenyon LLP
- Michael Rosato, Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati
