News

Here is a report on recent news and commentary related to the Federal Circuit and its cases. Today’s report highlights:

  • an article discussing how the Federal Circuit recently denied a mandamus petition;
  • another article analyzing the Federal Circuit’s recent rejection of constitutional challenges to inter partes revew proceedings;
  • another article focusing on how recent Federal Circuit decisions “have strengthened arguments for invalidating drug patents in two areas”; and
  • a blog post explaining how “the Federal Circuit assesses the equitable powers of a legislative court: the Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims.”

Dorothy Atkins filed an article with Law360 detailing how, in In re Netflix, Inc., “[t]he Federal Circuit . . . denied Netflix Inc.’s mandamus petition asking to have Avago Technologies’ lawsuit accusing the streaming giant of infringing five server patents stayed until U.S. District Judge Rodney Gilstrap decides Netflix’s motion to transfer the case to California.” Atkins noted that “Judge Gilstrap has said he’ll decide the motion quickly and has not issued other substantive orders.”

Jennifer Chheda published an article with Lexology assessing the Federal Circuit’s “[r]eject[ion] [of] new IPR constitutional challenges.” Chheda highlighted that, “[i]n Mobility Workx, LLC v. Unified Patents, LLC, the Federal Circuit in a split decision concluded that Mobility Workx, LLC’s constitutional challenges to structure and funding of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (‘PTAB’) are without merit.”

Perry Cooper and Ian Lopez wrote an article for Bloomberg Law explaining how “[p]harmaceutical companies are turning to a fast-moving but rarely used patent office process to undercut their competitors’ intellectual property.” Cooper and Ian emphasized that “[r]ecent U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit cases have strengthened arguments for invalidating drug patents in two areas—written description and enablement—allowed in post-grant review but not in inter partes review.”

Joel Smith authored a guest post for PatentlyO discussing how, in Taylor v. McDonough, “[t]he U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit assesses the equitable powers of a legislative court: the Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims.” Smith goes on to note that “a primary legal hurdle for Mr. Taylor” is Federal Circuit precedent holding that “applying equitable estoppel was outside the jurisdiction of the Veterans Court.”