Before Newman, Dyk, and Chen.  Appeal from the District of Colorado.

Summary: (1) The Federal Circuit’s separate affirmance of a PTAB decision that a patent in suit is invalid renders an appeal from a district court on that patent moot due to collateral estoppel; and (2) an ongoing royalty determination should consider patentee’s improved bargaining position after the jury verdict.

On May 14, 2018, several important revisions to regulations of the Bayh-Dole Act (University and Small Business Patent Procedure Act of 1980, codified as 35 U.S.C. § 200) went into effect. The final revisions were published in the Federal Register of April 18, 2018.

Before Reyna, Clevenger, and Wallach.  Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Colorado

Summary:  Even in a simple mechanical case, a narrow disclosure in the specification of a priority application may not provide adequate written description support for broad, later-issued claims which claim priority to that application.

On April 26, 2018, the China Drug Administration (CDA) released a draft guideline of implementing rules on pharmaceutical data exclusivity for public comments. The draft guideline expands the scope of data protection from innovative drugs to also now cover innovative therapeutic biologics, orphan drugs, pediatric drugs, as well as drug products that have succeeded in a patent challenge (“first generics”).

In vitro gametogenesis (IVG) is a recent development in reproductive technology, and has been used for creating mouse embryos in vitro. IVG includes obtaining cells from a donor (such as skin cells), and differentiating the cells in a laboratory culture dish into gametes (eggs and sperm). Differentiated eggs can be inseminated with differentiated sperm in the laboratory culture dish to generate embryos for implantation into a womb.

Before Prost, Newman, and Lourie. Appeal from the United States Patent and Trademark Office (PTAB)

Summary: A limitation that merely claims information by incorporating that information into a mental step or process is not entitled to patentable weight under the printed matter doctrine, unless the limitation is functionally related to the substrate.

Before Reyna, Bryson, and Stoll. Appeal from the Patent Trial and Appeal Board.

Summary: A petitioner in an Inter Partes Review may introduce new evidence not included in its petition if: 1) the evidence is a reply to evidence introduced by the patent owner or 2) the evidence documents the knowledge that skilled artisans would bring to bear in reading the prior art identified as producing obviousness.

Before Lourie, O’Malley, and Taranto.  Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas.

Summary:  Claims may be determined patent ineligible on the pleadings where no facts are asserted from which a non-abstract improvement may be plausibly inferred.  Advances within the realm of abstract ideas, no matter how ground-breaking, are insufficient to render a claim patent eligible.

Before Reyna, Linn, and Hughes. Petition for Writ of Mandamus from the District Court for the Eastern District of Texas.

Summary: A corporation incorporated in a state having multiple judicial districts “resides” for purposes of the patent venue statute only in the single judicial district within that state where it maintains a principal place of business, or failing that, the judicial district in which its registered office is located.

Before Hughes, Reyna, Stoll.  Appeal from the District of Minnesota.

Summary:  Specific personal jurisdiction over a foreign corporation is proper when the foreign corporation allegedly commits acts that infringe a U.S. patent on a U.S.-flagged ship regardless of whether the contract from which those acts arose specifies where the acts should take place.