Summary: Weaseling its way into embargo of the competition, Cisco relies on patents which are already deemed invalid

THE very act of granting a patent can lead to much devastation and pain. Examiners at the USPTO hopefully recognise this.

"We need to get rid of the notion that patents are a surrogate for innovation, especially when patent scope (e.g. leniency) can vary over time."For those who are still deluded enough to believe that the more patents get granted the greater innovation will be, see this report from earlier this summer. We need to get rid of the notion that patents are a surrogate for innovation, especially when patent scope (e.g. leniency) can vary over time.

Cisco is not an innovator; not as much as it's a monopolist or a near-monopoly in some areas. Days ago, one of Cisco's few competitors bought a company [1, 2]. To quote one of the reports: "He also spent seven year working at Cisco and apparently holds more than 10 patents for his work at both Cisco and at Juniper."

"Cisco is not an innovator; not as much as it's a monopolist or a near-monopoly in some areas."They are using patents to merely cement or protect their place in the market. It's protectionism. What is the value of these patents? Are these patents really indicative of innovation?

Well, judging by some of Cisco's ongoing legal cases, at least some of Cisco's patents are bogus. As covered here before, Cisco had been preying on its competitors using patents for a number of years and recently got an injunction enforced even though the patent at hand was deemed invalid by PTAB. "Now The ITC Is Banning Products Over Invalid Patents," CCIA exclaimed at the end of last month, framing the situation like this:

The International Trade Commission (ITC) is supposed to protect U.S. industries from unfair foreign competition. They’re supposed to consider the interests of the U.S. public. But recently, it seems more like the ITC is interested in the ITC’s own power, not the interests of U.S. industry or the public.

Setting aside problems with their procedures that would be solved by adopting the Trade Protection, Not Troll Protection bill proposed by Reps. Cardeñas and Farenthold, the ITC is now banning products—based on patents that the USPTO has declared invalid.

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This is just one more example of a recent ITC trend of ignoring the public interest and failing to protect U.S. industries.

A few weeks ago, the ITC decided to investigate Apple based on Qualcomm’s complaints. They did this even though Qualcomm’s complaint was part of a clear strategy to maintain their baseband processor monopoly, an issue briefed to the Commission by numerous third parties (including in my own comments filed at the ITC.) Instituting Qualcomm’s request harms the public interest, a direct contradiction of the ITC’s mission.

And now the ITC is going to exclude importation of products designed and sold by Arista Networks (headquartered in Santa Clara, California), because they don’t want to recognize the PTAB’s authority to determine that a patent should be withdrawn from issue. They’re going to bar the import of a U.S. company’s products because they don’t want to wait to see if the PTO’s decision will be upheld on appeal, even though most PTO decisions are.

What’s the point in telling the ITC to consider the interests of U.S. industry and the U.S. public if they aren’t going to bother doing so?

Well, in relation to that last line, we wrote many articles to show that ITC serves large US corporations at the expense of everyone else.

"Mr. Levy appears to have left (or gone inactive); the 'new' guy is a lot more focused on important areas and his articles in Patent Progress are worth paying attention to."We are happy to see some of the latest articles from CCIA. Mr. Levy appears to have left (or gone inactive); the 'new' guy is a lot more focused on important areas and his articles in Patent Progress are worth paying attention to. ⬆