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. 

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

Summary: Under Federal Circuit law, the plaintiff bears the burden of showing that venue is proper.  Further, an arms-length agreement with a call center in the relevant district is insufficient to show a regular and established place of business for venue.

Before Wallach, O’Malley, and Schall.  Appeal from the Patent Trial and Appeal Board.

Summary: PGR petitioner has standing to appeal PTAB decision, where petitioner intended to file an ANDA for the patented product as soon as possible.

Before NEWMAN, DYK, and STOLL.  Appeal from the Northern District of California.

Summary:  A consumer of a patented product has no standing under the Declaratory Judgment Act to challenge the validity of patents.

On May 2, 2018, high-end fashion designer and retailer Burberry Limited filed a complaint in the Southern District of New York against big box retailer Target Corporation alleging trademark infringement and trademark counterfeiting (among other claims) for Target’s alleged “repeated, willful and egregious misappropriation of Burberry’s famous and iconic luxury check trademarks.

A new infertility technique, mitochondrial replacement therapy (MRT), has been used to create so called “three-parent” babies. MRT is used in cases when mothers carry genes for mitochondrial diseases. Similar to in vitro fertilization (IVF), MRT involves removing an egg from a woman (mother), removing sperm from a man (father), fertilizing the egg with the sperm, allowing the fertilized egg to form a blastocyst, and then implanting the blastocyst into the mother’s womb.

In April 2018, a jury in the Eastern District of Texas awarded VirnetX Inc. (“VirnetX”) a total of more than $500,000,000 in its patent infringement suit against Apple Inc. (“Apple”).  The four patents-in-suit were directed to secure communication links such as Virtual Private Networks (VPN) and Domain Name Services (DNS).  This decision is the result of eight years of litigation between VirnetX and Apple, which included multiple trials.  In the original case, Apple I, a jury found that the Virtual Private Network On Demand (“VOD”), which allows an Apple user to automatically connect to a VPN, and FaceTime, as used in various Apple products, infringed VirnetX’s patents.