Archive for the ‘Hot Bench’ Category

En Banc Oral Argument: NantKwest v. Iancu

Thursday, March 8th, 2018

The Federal Circuit sat en banc today and heard the oral argument in NantKwest v. Iancu.  The case concerns the issue of whether the USPTO can chill efforts by an applicant to seek review by a district court of a USPTO rejection, by requiring the applicant to pay the USPTO’s attorneys’ fees for the judicial review, regardless of whether the applicant prevails at the district court.

You can listen to the oral argument here:

Hot Bench: Ultratec v. CaptionCall

Wednesday, September 20th, 2017

The oral argument in Ultratec, Inc. v. CaptionCall, LLC is a good example of a hot bench, Federal Circuit style.

The oral argument is available here:

 

Judge Moore’s opinion for the court is available here:  [Link].

If you note the 1:08:20 mark, the attorney for the Solicitor’s Office references examples of proceedings of the Board that she has listened in on.  I thought that was curious.  One normally does not think of the Solicitor’s Office as listening in on PTAB proceedings.

Oral argument of the day: LUNAREYE, INC. v. MATAL

Thursday, August 3rd, 2017

The oral argument of the day comes from LUNAREYE, INC. v. MATAL, No. 2016-1413 (Fed. Cir. July 24, 2017).  In this oral argument, the panel of judges pressed the Solicitor’s office on what the PTO’s position is with respect to whether the PTAB owes deference to district court determinations of claim construction.

You can listen to the oral argument: [here].

You can review the court’s Rule 36 Judgment [here].

I put this oral argument under the “hot bench” category.

Hot bench: In re Chudik

Friday, May 12th, 2017

The oral argument of In re Chudik is interesting for several reasons.  The associate solicitor faced a bit of a hot bench from the Federal Circuit panel with questions coming from the get-go.  Judges Reyna and Stoll fired a lot of questions at the Associate Solicitor and even Judge Dyk had some questions challenging the Office’s rejection of the claims.

The case is also interesting in that it deals with the language “arranged to” and whether the Office should interpret that language as structural or functional language.

The oral argument is available [here].

The court’s opinion is available [here].

En banc oral argument of In re Aqua Products

Monday, December 19th, 2016

The Federal Circuit sat en banc on December 9th to hear the en banc oral argument in In re Aqua Products, Inc.   Aqua challenges the Patent Trial and Appeal Board’s amendment procedures, which require the patentee to demonstrate that amended claims would be patentable over art of record.

You can listen to the en banc oral argument [here].

You can review the vacated panel opinion [here].

Aqua Products’ supplemental brief is available [here].