A U.S. appeals court said on Monday that Apple Inc, Google LLC, Cisco Systems Inc, and others may file a lawsuit against the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to contest a regulation that limited the amount of patent-validity hearings at a USPTO tribunal.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit overturned a federal court’s dismissal of the corporations’ action in California and said that the agency may not have followed the necessary public notice-and-comment rulemaking procedure.
Regarding the decision, the PTO refused to comment.
The business welcomes the ruling, according to Google spokesman José Castaeda, and is eager to present its case before the lower court. The verdict, according to a Cisco spokeswoman, confirms that the PTO’s patent review procedures are “an vital vehicle to retain a balanced patent system, safeguard innovation, and guarantee patent quality in the United States.”
Requests for comment from representatives of the other plaintiffs were not immediately fulfilled.
Big tech firms often the subject of patent litigation and who employ the board’s “inter partes review” procedure to challenge patents they are alleged to have violated enjoy favor with the Patent Trial and Appeal Board of the PTO. An internal regulation that allowed the agency’s judges broader power to refuse inter partes review petitions “dramatically curtailed access” to the process, the corporations told the appeals court.
In 2020, Apple, Google, Cisco, Intel Corporation, and Edwards Lifesciences Corporation sued the PTO in federal court in California over the regulation. They contended it weakened the function inter partes review plays in “preserving a robust patent system” and violated federal law.
In the Federal Circuit, businesses such as Tesla, Honda, Comcast, and Dell submitted papers in favor of the plaintiffs.
In 2021, the California court threw out the lawsuit, citing rules by the Patent Trial and Appeal Board that whether or not to hear inter partes review petitions cannot be appealed.
The corporations’ claims that the regulation was arbitrary and in violation of US patent law were likewise denied by the Federal Circuit. But, the three-judge panel said that it may have been necessary for the PTO to have a period of public notice and discussion prior to the rule’s creation and that it may be contested on the basis of that claim.
Apple Inc. v. Vidal, No. 22-1249, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, is the name of the case.
