Priya Sinha Cloutier

The Federal Circuit recently denied Haptic, Inc.'s petition for mandamus to overturn a district court order transferring their patent case from the Western District of Texas to the Northern District of California. Just so you know, Haptic is a start-up. The case involves Haptic alleging that Apple's “Back Tap” feature on iPhones infringes U.S. Patent No. 9,996,738, which covers gesture detection systems. Despite Haptic's deep Texas ties, the court ruled in favor of Apple's motion to transfer, emphasizing the convenience of parties and witnesses. 🔍 Key Takeaways: Private Interest Factors: - Ease of Access to Proof: Relevant evidence typically comes from the accused infringer, favoring transfer to California. - Compulsory Process for Witnesses: This factor was neutral. - Cost of Attendance for Witnesses: Favored transfer due to the concentration of Apple's personnel in Northern California. Public Interest Factors: - Local Interest: Significant local interest in California, where Apple's Back Tap feature was developed. - Court Congestion and Administrative Difficulties: These factors were neutral or slightly favored transfer. The district court's decision aligns with recent Federal Circuit guidance, emphasizing the importance of considering where the accused technology was developed. 💡 Implications for Practitioners: This case underscores the weight courts give to the convenience of parties and witnesses in transfer motions, particularly in patent cases involving large tech companies. It also highlights the evolving considerations of venue and jurisdiction in IP litigation. #IntellectualProperty #PatentLaw #LegalUpdate #CAFC #IPStrategy #VenueTransfer #Mandamus #USPatentLaw #IPLitigation #PatentLitigation #TechLawyer Link to the full document: (https://lnkd.in/gVr7--56)

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The Federal Circuit's Rule 36 practice of issuing summary affirmances without opinion in a significant number of patent cases, like ParkerVision v. TCL, has sparked debate. This practice, backed by multiple amicus briefs, raises concerns about judicial transparency, due process, and statutory compliance. Courts play a vital role in providing written explanations for decisions to ensure accountability, facilitate meaningful appellate review, and establish legal precedent. However, the Rule 36 practice bypasses this crucial aspect, leaving parties and the public uninformed. The implications are profound: - Statutory Violation: ParkerVision contends that 35 U.S.C. § 144 mandates the Federal Circuit to issue opinions in appeals from the USPTO. - Transparency & Precedent: The absence of opinions leaves practitioners and inventors without clear insights into the court's interpretation of patent law, creating ambiguity in a field reliant on precise guidance. - National Security Concerns: Amicus briefs underscore how this lack of transparency could impact U.S. innovation, especially in pivotal technology sectors like wireless communications, where foreign entities might exploit patent vulnerabilities. Beyond individual cases, the Federal Circuit's reliance on Rule 36 hampers Supreme Court scrutiny by concealing the legal rationale behind rulings. This opacity affects inventors, businesses, and policymakers and undermines confidence in a system designed to safeguard innovation and economic progress. #PatentLaw #DueProcess #Rule36 #IP #Innovation #USLaw #TechLawyer

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From Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP: Upending over 40 years of precedent, this decision is expected to have a significant impact on the landscape of obtaining and enforcing design patents. Design patent owners and challengers alike should follow post-LKQ decisions and the relevant USPTO guidance closely to understand how this more-flexible obviousness analysis will impact design patent invalidity and patentability determinations moving forward. #designpatents #uspto #intellectualproperty #obviousness #patents

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USTR is proposing increasing tariffs on China-origin tungsten to 25%, and on China-origin wafers and polysilicon to 50%. This is on top of a tariff increase on solar cells. Will this result in more production capacity in the United States? I've linked an article from PV Tech that argues it will not. https://lnkd.in/eX7FkC9k

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My Foley colleagues discuss the CHIPS Act and the new era of semiconductor innovation in this Innovative Technology article. Click below to learn more. #InnovativeTechnology #IP #Semiconductors

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New §101 Ammunition for Arguments On September 9, 2024, in Contour IP Holding, LLC v. GoPro, INC., the Federal Circuit found that the district court improperly characterized the claims at an “impermissibly high level of generality”. Thus, the Federal Circuit ruled the claims recited eligible subject matter at Alice step one. In this case, the district court found the claims were directed to the abstract idea of creating and transmitting video at two different resolutions and adjusting the video’s settings remotely. The Federal Circuit disagreed, finding that the claims, 𝘄𝗵𝗲𝗻 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱 𝗮𝘀 𝗮 𝘄𝗵𝗼𝗹𝗲, was directed to “specific, technological means - parallel data stream recording with the low-quality recording wirelessly transferred to a remote device - that in turn provide[s] a technological improvement to the real time viewing capabilities of a POV camera’s recordings on a remote device.” The key reasoning was that the district court’s decisions was based on an “impermissibly high level of generality” as laid out in Enfish. In Enfish, the Court stated that the practice of “describing the claims at such a high level of abstraction and untethered from the language of the claims all but ensures that the exceptions to § 101 swallow the rule.” Enfish, 822 F.3d at 1337 Main Takeaways for Patent Owners: (1): Argue step 1 of Alice when the claims have been characterized at a “ impermissibly high level of generality”. (2) The Court seems to rely on the fact that the POV camera was able to “operate differently than it otherwise could” as disclosed in the written description. So it could be wise to include how operation is changed when writing up your specification. —— ** None of the information on this post should be considered legal advice. This post is for educational and/or informational purposes only. Please consult a qualified attorney for your specific legal situation.

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The government has imposed licensing requirements for exports to *all destinations worldwide* of certain gate all-around field effect transistor technology, quantum computing items, advanced semiconductor manufacturing equipment, additive manufacturing equipment, and aerospace coating systems technology. The new measures are notable for their restrictive application to all destinations in the world and their institution of a new license exception that allows for exports of the newly controlled items to specified “like-minded” countries that have instituted comparable export controls that are harmonized with U.S. controls. My colleagues Anthony Rapa, Alan kashdan, and Brendan Saslow offer five key takeaways on the new rule. #internationaltrade #exportcontrols #crossbordertrade

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🛠️ Do you do competitor teardowns—on your competitor's patents? No more stealth purchases and breaking out the Torx 🪛 Use patents or whitepapers, or other literature that may exist— Here I've selected a benign example of US20230176593, it's the most recent patent publication for which Elon Musk is named as an inventor. This one's very conceptual in nature, with the actual implementation abstracted into code. Could be about ride hailing, but probably more about retrieving your own car from the valet station. ➡️ Tell me about this patent  ➡️ Is this a robotaxi patent?  ➡️ Tell me about the problems this patet solves and the advantages it achieves ➡️ Give me some inventive improvements over this patent relating to safety convenience and user experience ➡️ Now give me some wildcard S-curve jumps that would render this patent obsolete You get the picture— some of the S-curve suggestions are indeed wild—like Neuralink x Tesla autonomous control 🧠⚡️🚖 ‼️ 🚘 #tesla 💎#innovation 💻#softwarepatents 

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Thanks to amazing USPTO and law firm mentors, I've infrequently felt my minority status (female Asian) impeded my patent career. But as a fellow minority, I hear from many others about their private struggles. If you're interested in supporting others start their patent career (as a mentor) or are interested in a starting a patent career yourself, check out Patent Pathways! www.patentpathways.org

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Some trends about the caselaw worldwide related to patents asserted before the Unified Patent Court (UPC)… The UPC provides, for the first time, a means to enforce patents across 17 European states, creating an environment capable of rivalling that of other major global patent jurisdictions. Globally, it is interesting to note that among the 78 patents asserted before the UPC in 2023, within infringement cases, 45% were not asserted in another jurisdiction worldwide. And, of those patents that were asserted in other courts additionally to the UPC, two thirds were at issue before a national German Court and one third before a United States Court. Moreover, among the 27 revocation cases filed before the UPC, 44% (12) show a parallel EPO opposition case on the same EP patent, showing that frequently there was no choice between EPO and UPC. Read more about the past year's cases before the UPC in Clarivate's latest report presenting the data curated by Darts-ip: https://lnkd.in/g9PjjNHc

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Does the #USPTO’s proposed patent terminal disclaimer rule create heightened risk? In an IPWatchdog, Inc article, Partners Phil Harris and Nathan Mutter share strategies for #patent drafting, filing, and prosecution if the rule is adopted, noting “properly applying the new [rule] will likely take time and repetition for examiners to understand…This will make practitioner examiner interviews even more critical…to convince an examiner of non-obviousness.” Read here: https://lnkd.in/gqRYhCGq #PatentFees #PatentLaw

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The IQ Battle of Memory 💾 Intel (I) and Qualcomm (Q) were in a 5 year long battle for a chipset patent (US8838949) infringement. Last year it came to an end with Intel succeeding in invalidating Qualcomm’s patent. 💾The case was hanging around the claim construction of some elements in the independent and dependent claims. The most crucial one was the term “hardware buffer” in claims 1, 2 and 8. 💾 Once again the interpretation of the term was key in deciding if the patent was valid or not. Stronger support in the specification could have strengthened the patent's validity? 💾Let’s dive into the details of the matter. #patentinfringement #claimconstruction #Qualcomm #Intel

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If you’re interested in how advances in AI are impacting intellectual property law and the creation of new IP, I recommend this article by Marc Vockell at The University of Texas System. It is well written and a great place to start on this topic. https://lnkd.in/gqqivjWp #artificialintelligence #technology #AI

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Our recent blog discusses a recent UPC decision relating to preliminary injunctions. Click the link below to learn more:

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In a recent en banc decision concerning the standard for assessing obviousness challenges to design patents, the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit discarded its long-standing standard, known as the Rosen-Durling test and regarded by many as overly-rigid, and held that the standard for design patents should be the same as for utility patents. Read more here: https://bit.ly/4bLOJfn #patents #IP

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How much of the UK patent court's time is spent on hearings and trials linked to cases with a FRAND element? Answer: ~20% I scraped all ~650 patent court judgments published in the national archives and classified them into FRAND or non-FRAND classes by string matching at least one instance of the term "FRAND". I then extracted from each judgment text: (i) the number of days the associated hearing/trial was listed for and (ii) the character count of the judgment text to use as a proxy for how long the judge spent on the write up. The resulting data is shown in the plots below. The main takeaways: (i) Around 20% of the letters Judges are putting to paper and around 20% of hearing time are linked to cases with a FRAND element. (ii) Judgments appear to be getting longer across the board! #FRAND #litigation #patents

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