Bridget Smith and Kenneth Weatherwax of Lowenstein & Weatherwax filed an amicus brief on behalf of 39 inventors in an upcoming Supreme Court case involving the constitutional status of Patent Trial and Appeal Board administrative patent judges who preside over patent validity trials at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. The Court granted certiorari on two questions: whether the administrative patent judges are principal officers who must be appointed by the President with consent from the Senate, and whether, assuming they are, the Federal Circuit’s remedy of severing civil service protections properly cured their unconstitutional appointment.  The inventors’ friend-of-the court brief provides the Court with information on the real-world consequences of the PTAB trial regime on small entities and individuals and which potential “severance” remedies would and would not cure the constitutional problem.