Source: http://www.gbpatent.com/content/newsletters/Reexam/re11.htm
Timestamp: 2019-04-24 16:26:47+00:00

Document:
Since September 16, 2012, 502 petitions have been identified in the PTAB’s listing of proceedings for inter partes review (“IPR petitions”) and post grant review against certain patents directed to covered business methods (“CBM petitions”). During August, 2013, 61 petitions for IPR and 9 petitions for CBM were filed.
Please click here for the latest spreadsheet reflecting all filings through August 31, 2013.
As of the end of August, the PTAB has instituted, and trial is ongoing in, 168 of the 502 listed proceedings; 288 petitions await decision.
5 petitions by Dominion Dealer Solutions, LLC against patents owned by AutoAlert Inc., denied on August 12 and 15 (IPR2013-00220, -00222, -00223, -00224, -00225).
All of the above listed proceedings, except Universal Remote Control, Inc. v. Universal Electronics, Inc., IPR2013-00168 (August 26, 2013) (Blankenship, Medley and Boalick), were decided on the now familiar standard (no reasonable likelihood that Petitioner would prevail with respect to at least one challenged claim).
Universal Remote Control, Inc. is of interest as a counterpart to Motorola Mobility LLC v. Arnouse, IPR2013-00010. On January 30, 2013, a three judge panel (Tierney, Chang and Bisk) held in Motorola Mobility LLC v. Arnouse, IPR2013-00010, that the one year time period for filing an inter partes review under 35 U.S.C. § 315(b) is triggered not by the date of filing of the complaint by the plaintiff/patent owner but by the date of service of the summons upon the defendant/petitioner. As such, the petitioner was not barred from filing the petition in that proceeding.
Petitioner was served with a complaint alleging infringement of the '426 patent on two occasions. The first complaint, in connection with a first case styled Universal Electronics, Inc. v. Universal Remote Control, Inc., Case No. SAVC 00-1125 AHS (EEx)(C.D. Cal.), was served on Petitioner on March 21, 2001. The second complaint, in connection with a second case styled Universal Electronics Inc., v. Universal Remote Control, Inc., Case No. SACV 12-00329 AG (JPRx) (C.D. Cal.), was served on Petitioner less than 12 months prior to the filing date of the Petition.
Twenty proceedings have been terminated by settlement. As reported in the August KEEPING TABS, one other proceeding was terminated prior to institution based on the patent owner’s refusal to participate. An IPR proceeding erroneously filed as a Post Grant Review (PGR) in the PTAB’s Patent Review Processing System (PRPS) was dismissed and the petition payment refunded (PGR2013-00007, dismissed, June 14, 2013); so far, no true PGR proceeding has been requested.
PTAB Orders Stay Of Ex Parte Reexamination In Light Of Petition For Inter Partes Review.
In Lumondi Inc.v. Lennon Image Technologies LLC, IPR2013-00432 (Paper No. 7, August 6, 2013), a PTAB panel (Pothier, Arbes and Ward) acknowledged that under 35 U.S.C. § 305 they “will not ordinarily stay a reexamination because, in the absence of good cause, reexaminations are conducted with special dispatch,” but stated that concurrent proceedings “would duplicate efforts within the Office and could potentially result in inconsistencies,” as the patent owner could amend claims in the reexamination while the PTAB is conducting the inter partes review.
Although the proceedings are based on different prior art and were filed by different parties, several of the claims were challenged in both proceedings creating a possibility of inconsistency; and a PTAB decision may simplify the issues in reexamination. The Board therefore, exercised its discretion under 35 U.S.C. § 315(d) and 37 C.F.R. § 42.122(a) to stay the reexamination.
Magistrate Judge Recommends Stay In Light of Third Party Petition For Inter Partes Review.
In e-Watch, Inc. v. ACTi Corp. (Civil No. SA-12-CA-695-FB, W. Texas) Plaintiff e-Watch filed complaint for patent infringement of four patents against Defendant ACTi in July 2012. Third party Mobotix petitioned for inter partes review (IPR) of three of the four patents on or before June 7, 2013. ACTi then filed a motion to stay proceedings in the district court.
The Magistrate Judge weighed the following three factors: (1) the stage of the litigation in the Court, (2) simplification of the issues and trial, and (3) undue prejudice and tactical considerations. The Court found that although e-Watch initiated the case more than a year before the motion to stay, ACTi had represented without rebuttal from e-Watch that “discovery thus far [is] limited to an exchange of Preliminary Disclosures” and neither side had submitted evidence to show it had spent “significant time or money to prepare for claim construction,” and that the stage of the litigation weighed in favor of a stay.
e-Watch asserted that the parties are “Direct Competitors” and sought injunctive relief, but did not submit “any evidence that the parties have ever competed for a sale or are ‘direct competitors’” and did “not identify how it will be injured if the Court grants a stay.” The Magistrate Judge cited a Middle District of Florida case that “if the PTO declines inter partes review, little time is lost, but if [the] PTO grants inter partes review, the promise is greater for an important contribution by the PTO to resolution of the governing issues in the litigation,” and found that the undue prejudice factor weighs in favor of a stay.
The Magistrate Judge also noted that it would be inappropriate to stay the litigation for the three patents subject to the IPR and continue litigation on the remaining patent. This would significantly increase costs requiring two trials and concluded that staying the whole case pending the IPR would “simplify the issues and streamline the trial.” The Magistrate Judge therefore recommended that the Motion for Stay be granted.
The following representative Trial Hearing Orders have been posted on the PTAB’s website at http://www.uspto.gov/ip/boards/bpai/representative_orders_and_opinions.jsp. The matter to which each pertains is summarized by the title. IPR2012-00005 and -00027 are worth reviewing if you are thinking of amending your claims. Regarding IPR2013-00043, additional discovery was granted as to lab notebooks but denied as to samples of the compositions involved and further information as to “inconsistent positions” beyond that required by routine discovery.
The PTAB continues its practice of posting informative opinions (http://www.uspto.gov/ip/boards/bpai/decisions/inform/index.jsp#heading-1) and precedential opinions (http://www.uspto.gov/ip/boards/bpai/decisions/prec/index.jsp) on its website.
Two recent ex parte appeal decisions of interest are found there, namely Ex parte Talkowski, No. 2012-002290 (May 24, 2013) and Ex parte Mewherter (Appeal 2012-007692) (May 8, 2013).
Non-analogous art. The informative opinion, Talkowski, was authored by Judge McKelvey, for a panel also including Judges Best and Praiss. The opinion explores and distinguishes the two-step “test” for analogousness as stated in In re Wood, 599 F.2d 1032 (CCPA 1979).
Given the significant amount of available guidance and evidence supra, we conclude that those of ordinary skill in the art would understand the claim term “machine-readable storage medium” would include signals per se. Further, where, as here, the broadest reasonable interpretations of all the claims each covers a signal per se, the claims must be rejected under 35 § 101 as covering non-statutory subject matter. See In re Nuijten, 500 F.3d 1346, 1356-57 (Fed. Cir. 2007) (transitory embodiments are not directed to statutory subject matter).

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