Los Angeles, CA – June 3, 2014 –
Today the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office Patent & Trademark Appeal Board (PTAB) agreed with L&W’s arguments in four covered business method (“CBM”) post-grant proceeding under the America Invents Act, and denied all four petitions seeking to invalidate patents owned by L&W’s client. The PTAB ruled that because one of the petitioning companies had previously filed an action challenging the patents, the petitions were barred in their entirety. These decisions extend the PTAB’s acceptance of L&W’s arguments in an earlier decision on March 20, 2014, which denied institution of review for another patent owned by the same client and established for the first time that this statutory bar applies in CBM patent review proceedings. The proceedings are PTAB case nos. CBM2014-00038, -00039, -00040 and -00041, and CBM2013-00059.