Here is a report on recent news and commentary related to the Federal Circuit and its cases. Today’s report highlights:
- an article discussing “the latest litigant to head to the U.S. Supreme Court with complaints about the Federal Circuit’s practice of issuing one-sentence Rule 36 orders”; and
- an article about the Federal Circuit affirming a judgment that a “patented configuration for a gambling terminal ‘Tic-Tac-Fruit’ game was abstract and thus ineligible for protection.”
Andrew Karpan wrote an article for Law360 discussing “the latest litigant to head to the U.S. Supreme Court with complaints about the Federal Circuit’s practice of issuing one-sentence Rule 36 orders.” As explained by Karpan, a small business owner is asking the Supreme Court to force the Federal Circuit to “go into greater detail on a trio of affirmations the court handed down last October” because the judges “were handed inconsistent claim constructions and the affirmance does not state which claim constructions were held correct, thereby making it impossible for patent owner and the public to know how the claims were construed.” For more information, see our case page for Schwendimann v. Neenah, Inc.
Michael Shapiro authored an article for BloombergLaw about the Federal Circuit affirming a judgment that a “patented configuration for a gambling terminal ‘Tic-Tac-Fruit’ game was abstract and thus ineligible for protection.” Shapiro notes how the Federal Circuit rejected appellant’s argument that “its patent reflected a technological leap tied to the way it incorporated a preview display feature.” The opinion came in Savvy Dog Systems, LLC v. Pennsylvania Coin, LLC.