Source: https://www.b2ipreport.com/swip-report/ptab-no-technical-solution-covered-business-method-patent/
Timestamp: 2019-04-22 04:29:05+00:00

Document:
Patent claims directed to an electronic inventory patent recited a covered business method, and moreover are patent-ineligible, said the PTAB in a Final Written Decision in a Covered Business Method (CBM) proceeding. Life Technologies Corporation v. Unisone Strategic IP, Inc., Case CBM2016-00025; Patent 6,996,538 B2/C1 (PTAB June 23, 2017). This case will be interesting to many in part because of the Patent Owner’s unsuccessful attempt to contest the PTAB’s subject matter jurisdiction based on its failure to submit responses or participate in the proceedings as called for in the Scheduling Order. But I write about it because the PTAB’s analysis of the validity question under 35 U.S.C. § 101 is an exemplar of how the problem-solution approach has taken over patent-eligibility analysis, albeit in this case in the context of determining whether claims qualify for Covered Business Method Review under § 18 of the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act (“AIA”).
wherein said client software allows one or more customers, manufacturers, suppliers, or distributors to be classified into groups, and where permissions or roles are assigned to such groups.
This claim qualified for Covered Business Method Review under AIA § 18(d)(1) because steps related to tracking inventory were “financial in nature.” There was no technical invention; rather, conventional computing technology was used.
And to that point, the claim did not qualify for the “technological invention” exclusion in AIA § 18(d)(1). In a CBM proceeding, a technical invention is determined, “on a case-by-case basis” by “whether the claimed subject matter as a whole recites a technological feature that is novel and unobvious over the prior art; and solves a technical problem using a technical solution.” 37 C.F.R. § 42.301.
The challenged claims having qualified for Covered Business Method Review, it was easy to hold them unpatentable under 35 U.S.C. § 101; as noted above, the Patent Owner had failed to earlier participate in the proceedings, and now was held to have waived arguments not previously made to support patentability.

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