Bonum Certa Men Certa

Number of Filings at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) Highest in Almost Two Years

Objections (post-grant) to particular US patents

Andrei IancuSummary: Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) inter partes reviews (IPRs), which typically invalidate software patents by citing 35 U.S.C. €§ 101, are withstanding negative rhetoric and hostility from Iancu (on the right)

IMPROVING the quality of US patents would improve their overall value. Maybe not revenue of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), but it's not a corporation and it has no shareholders.



Michael Loney has just crunched some numbers and it looks encouraging. PTAB is, in the simplest of terms, some entity you can tell, "hey, this patent is rubbish, invalidate it already!" And they do. So this highest filing level (in nearly 2 years) is good news for patents' quality:

November’s 230 petitions filed at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board was the highest monthly figure since January 2017, while the newly-formed Precedential Opinion Panel will address issue joinder

Challengers flocked to the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) in November, with 230 petitions filed. This was the largest monthly figure since the 246 petitions in January 2017.


Unhappy about 35 U.S.C. €§ 101, Watchtroll is attacking SCOTUS again. This is from yesterday. They're totally losing their minds and their 'business' (litigation). The writer this time is Eric Guttag, who boasts "private intellectual [sic] property [sic] law experience on patent, trademark, copyright, trade secret" (what he actually means by 'IP'). It was only yesterday that we wrote about these ugly tendencies of Watchtroll in light of SCOTUS' insistence on Alice, not to mention insistence on IPRs (Oil States).

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