Bonum Certa Men Certa

Growth in Petitions Against Questionable Patents (PTAB IPRs) and Patent Trolls' Migration to China

In spite of fee hikes, inter partes reviews (IPRs) are still up

Shanghai road



Summary: The United States is saying goodbye to a lot of the nuisance which held back development of good products; there's meanwhile a reported surge in patent litigation in China (up as much as 85% in Guangdong)

The Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) is seeing work being shifted to it from what otherwise might have been court battles. This is good because it keeps disputes within the realms of the USPTO, hence less expensive (favours the interests of relatively small firms which are easy target/prey to trolls). Attempts to use the Supreme Court’s SAS Institute v Iancu to slow down PTAB (giving it more workload) aren't succeeding. The patent maximalists have just said this:

Chief Judge Ruschke reveals 44% of pending cases were not instituted on all grounds and that the Board has already granted more than a dozen extensions to trials in response to SAS


"CAFC [the Federal Circuit] Determines No Requirement To Reopen Non-Instituted Claims Post-SAS" however, according to Josh Landau, who 3 days ago wrote this:

PGS owns a patent on certain techniques for marine seismic surveying.

In November 2014, WesternGeco challenged the validity of PGS’s patent at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB). The PTAB instituted IPR on some, but not all, of the PGS patent’s claims. WesternGeco settled out of the IPR, but the PTAB continued the IPR. In June 2016, the PTAB invalidated some of the claims on which it had instituted the IPR.

PGS appealed the PTAB’s final decision to the Federal Circuit, and the case was argued in April of 2018, a week after the SAS opinion was handed down.

Faced with the question of whether to reopen claims where institution was denied, the Federal Circuit determined that there was no reason (particularly where no party requested it) to reopen those claims, and that it was permissible to deal with only the claims that the PTAB actually decided.


We're going to revisit this separately later today (in relation to more relevant an argument/context).

"...It's up an incredible 85% in Guangdong; good for patent lawyers, but we know at whose expense."In the meantime, statistics speak for themselves. Instead of filing patent lawsuits, based on these numbers, people and firms now file complaints about bogus patents to be invalidated by the USPTO (which wrongly granted these). To quote:

Post-Oil States PTAB filing increases while district court patent case filing slumps to lowest figure this year

Patent Trial and Appeal Board petition filing was up in May while district court patent case filing slumped.


PTAB is becoming the big scene with all the action. Soon, according to this morning's post, "Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) Judges Kalyan Deshpande, Susan Mitchell, and Michael Zecher will provide an explanation of Board jurisdiction, rules, and proceedings, and then lead a discussion on practice tips for successful oral and written advocacy in the PTAB forum."

Where have all the trolls gone? Some of them moved to China. As Jacob Schindler from the patent trolls' lobby (IAM) put it just before the weekend, in China "the number of first instance patent cases grew by nearly 30% year-on-year to about 16,000 in 2017. The Supreme People’s Court (SPC) reports that more than half of this activity took place in the three key regions that are home to specialised IP courts – Beijing, Shanghai and Guangdong."

It's up an incredible 85% in Guangdong; good for patent lawyers, but we know at whose expense. China's embrace of patent maximalism is a shot in its own foot.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Credit Suisse collapse obfuscated Parreaux, Thiébaud & Partners scandal
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
UK Media Under Threat: Cannot Report on Data Breach, Cannot Report on Microsoft Staff Strangling Women
The story of super injunction (in the British media this week, years late)
Under the Guise of "MIT Technology Review Insights" the Site MIT Technology Review Posts Corporate Spam as 'Articles'
Some of the articles aren't even articles but 'hit pieces' against Free software and some are paid advertisements
Brett Wilson LLP Has Track Record in Scam Coin Cases (e.g. Craig Wright and More), Now It Works for 'Crypto' Scam Purveyors
But wait, it gets worse
Will Brett Wilson LLP Handle Its Own Winding Up Petition or be Struck Off for Overt Abuse of Process?
Today we sue not only the first Microsofter
Ubuntu Becomes Microsoft GitHub, Based on Decision Made by British Army Officer
You're hopeless, Canonical
Sharing Code and Recipes
It helps explain the triviality of software freedom
How Many Women Has Microsoft's Alex Balabhadra Graveley Already Strangled and Where Does That End?
If you too are a victim of this man and wish to share information, contact us
 
Links 17/07/2025: "Blog Identity Crisis" and Openwashing by Nvidia
Links for the day
Greffiers and the US Attorney of the Serial Strangler From Microsoft
The lawsuit can help expose extensive corruption in the American court system as well
The People Who Promoted systemd in Debian Also Promote Wayland
This is not politics
Victims of the Serial Strangler From Microsoft, Alex Balabhadra Graveley, Wanted to Sue Him But Lacked the Funds (He Attacked Their Finances)
Having spoken to victims of the Serial Strangler From Microsoft
Links 17/07/2025: Science, Hardware, and Censorship
Links for the day
Gemini Links 17/07/2025: Staying in the "Small Web" and Back on ICQ
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, July 16, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, July 16, 2025
Exclusive: corruption in Tribunals, Greffiers, from protection rackets to cat whisperers
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Links 16/07/2025: Chip Bans and Microsoft’s “Digital Escort” Program
Links for the day
Revolving Doors: One Day You're a Judge, the Next Day You're an Attorney Paying Public Officials and Working for Violent and Dangerous Microsoft Employees
how the US justice system works
Slopwatch: Noise, Plagiarism and Even Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt/Fear-mongering/Dramatisation
What are we meant to do to prevent a false association or misleading connotations? Game the LLMs? No. Boycott slopfarms.
Gemini Links 16/07/2025: BaseLibre Numerical System and Simple Web Browsing with TLS
Links for the day
Links 16/07/2025: Fascist Slop Takes "Intelligence" Clothing, New Criminal Case Against MElon
Links for the day
"We Might Save Somebody's Life"
I follow the example of my father
Why I am Suing the Serial Strangler From Microsoft, Alex Balabhadra Graveley, in the UK High Court This Week
Out of respect to the process and to the Court, I shall not share any pertinent details about the case
Links 16/07/2025: China’s Economy Grows Steadily, France Takes Action Regarding Harm to Children by GAFAM and Fentanylware (TikTok)
Links for the day
It is Not About Politics
Beware the people who try to make this about politics
Good Journalism Saves Lives
a shocking number of women die or get seriously hurt every day due to violence from a partner
Recognition of Women's Contributions to Free Software
Being passive is not an option when bad things are happening
Slopfarms Are Going to Perish Because Public Opinion is Changing
Many slopfarms will simply go offline
19 Years of Standing Up for Justice, Equality, and Truth
This week we shall take it up a notch
Gemini Links 16/07/2025: Tmux and OCC25 Working TLS
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, July 15, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, July 15, 2025
Links 15/07/2025: LLM Pollution and Pushback in Ukraine
Links for the day
Gemini Links 15/07/2025: xkcd, New Cert, and Alhena Gemlog
Links for the day
Links 15/07/2025: Press Freedom at Risk and New Facebook Blunders
Links for the day
Reboots Should Never be Necessary
"BUT WHAT ABOUT SECURITY!!"
There's Still Hope for the World Wide Web
Let's hope that the trajectory of the Web won't be leading us to over-reliance on Google, nor will it reward worthless slopfarms
Gemini Links 15/07/2025: Smolweb and Alhena 5.1.7
Links for the day
The Danes Want GNU/Linux
David Heinemeier Hansson recently moved to GNU/Linux
Cory Doctorow Explains Why Software Freedom Matters, Whereas "Open Source" Misses the Point and Helps Monopolies
It's a very long article
BillPR (EpsteinGate-Bribed NPR) is Turning Into a Partial Slopfarm that Promotes Slop
"I went on a date with a chatbot!"
Two Weeks Passed Since Latest Large Wave of Microsoft Layoffs, More Expected Next Month
Blaming the debt on "AI" is just self-serving storytelling
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, July 14, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, July 14, 2025
Gemini Links 15/07/2025: Gemini "Style Sheets" and Switching From Microsoft GitHub to Codeberg
Links for the day