Guest post by Jonathan Stroud and Sam Korte, Senior Principal Counsel – IP at Garmin. An exotic insurance product has recently taken the litigation world by storm. Judgment preservation insurance, or JPI, was neither offered nor widely discussed, at least publicly, as recently as five years ago…READ MORE HERE

The Perryman Group reviews the proposed rulemaking and legislation of IPR matters and if were implemented, the result would be a reduction in IPR proceedings even for cases that are otherwise meritorious. As a consequence, the economic efficiency benefits associated with the IPR process would be substantially diminished. READ MORE HERE

In a recent op-ed for RealClearPolicy, Unified’s CEO and Founder, Kevin Jakel, explains how the recent USPTO’s Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (ANPRM) proposals could put the American economy at risk and limit access to government patent review for all. Many ANPRM proposals aim to restrict petitions to the government for review of invalid patents. This would limit the work done by Unified…READ MORE

This paper argues and shows that making Fintiv permanent could generate a direct economic cost of at least $283 million. Based on the data used, as explained further below, and because it is difficult to quantify the indirect costs, this estimate is likely an underestimate of the rule’s true economic cost. READ MORE…

The Perryman Group, in a recent economic study commissioned by Unified Edge, has found that over the next 10 years, the total economic benefit of reducing discretionary denials of inter partes review proceedings under criteria such as the NHK-Fintiv rules will lead to an increase in US business activity of $482.1 million, $230.4 million in personal income, and approximately 2,000 job-years of employment. READ MORE…

Jonathan Stroud, explains the issues with the USPTO’s reform proposal, including how it singles out Unified and proposes restrictions that contradict the AIA and that have been rejected in subsequent failed legislative proposals. Mr. Stroud argues that if the agency seeks to single out Unified Patents and bar it from filing IPRs, it must also scrutinize the lack of transparency and conduct of prolific NPEs.

Click HERE to read the article.

John Jarosz and his team of economists at the Analysis Group have published a paper on the benefits of royalty-free licensing. Read the abstract HERE…

In an op-ed published in "The Hill" website, Jonathan Stroud summarizes the House Judiciary oversight hearing where USPTO Director Kathi Vidal testified regarding the Office’s proposed rulemaking. READ MORE

On February 10, 2023, Unified Edge filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court concerning the test for whether a patent has met the statutory requirement for enablement—i.e., the requirement that the specification sufficiently disclose the claimed invention in such full, clear, …READ MORE

Overall patent litigation was down a bit and the PTAB was up a bit as budgets tightened down with the lackluster economic performance. NPEs both Patent Assertion Entities and Aggregators continued to increase their activities. NPEs continued to be the largest number of filers. READ MORE

On August 18, 2022, Unified filed an amicus brief in IPR2021-010641 — this administration's first Director-initiated review of issues — concerning how the PTAB should address sanctionable conduct in post-grant proceedings. The brief emphasizes the importance to the public interest of PTAB review…READ MORE

In 2021, in more than 45% of all IPR institution decisions (420 of 918), the PTAB spent considerable time and resources dealing with the discretionary considerations under the NHK Spring-Fintiv rule. But with more than a year since Director Iancu stepped down from the USPTO, Fintiv and 314(a) denials have plummeted dramatically…READ MORE

NPE filing activity increased 14.8% this quarter with 656 total district court filings this quarter versus 525 filings last quarter. In addition, as the USPTO Director Kathi Vidal begins to tackle Fintiv and provide guidance on it, reexaminations have dropped 25.8% since last year, to levels akin to those of 5 years ago…READ MORE

It has been a banner quarter for those trying to avoid merits-based review of their patents at the USPTO. With 74 procedural denials to start the first three months of 2021—a quarterly record—it is projected that denials will rise by nearly 30% for the year, from 228 to nearly 300…READ MORE

The Patent Trial and Appeal Board’s (PTAB) inter partes review institution rate has dropped every year since the launch of IPRs, and so far in 2019, is at 54%, as compared to above 80% in 2013, the first full year of the Board’s modern set-up…READ MORE

The Perryman Group found the PTAB has grown the U.S. economy, saved U.S. manufacturing jobs, and reduced litigation costs…READ MORE

For years, the Eastern District of Texas (EDTX) was the hot spot for NPE patent litigation, reaching a peak of 2,411 cases in 2015, or roughly half of all filings, nearly all going to Judge Gilstrap. Since 2015, however, NPE cases... READ MORE

On January 14, 2022, Unified Patents filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court in support of the petition for certiorari in Intel Corp. v. VLSI Tech. LLC, challenging the USPTO's reliance on their own NHK-Fintiv ruling, as well as the reviewability of such a de facto rule on appeal. READ MORE

As the new year begins, NPEs (Patent Assertion Entities) this quarter filed less leading to a drop in patent disputes across all venues. NPE litigation overall is down 10.4% compared to last quarter. Interestingly, looking at NPE cases over the past couple of years, 80% of them typically terminated within one year of the filing date.…READ MORE

One takeaway is that if the economy weakens further, NPE assertions will likely increase significantly if the previous pattern repeats. Using the Unified Patents litigation and NPE data with the Stanford NPE Litigation Database for pre-2013 data, Unified Patents examined the number of lawsuits brought by NPEs and PAEs…READ MORE

On September 28, 2021, Unified filed an amicus curiae brief with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in support of a mandamus petition related to what it views as systemic delays in decisions on venue in patent-heavy District Court dockets, READ MORE

On May 24, 2021, Unified filed an amicus curiae brief with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in support of a mandamus petition related to a denial of transfer. The brief argues that the Western District judge's decision not to transfer a case…READ MORE

On May 21, 2021, Unified filed an amicus curiae brief in support of en banc review by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Apple v. Qualcomm on the issue of the court's increasingly patent-focused, Circuit-specific rules surrounding appellate standing. READ MORE

On April 26, 2021, Unified, along with The Computer & Communications Industry Association (CCIA) and CableLabs, filed an amicus brief in re Vulcan Industrial Holdings, a petition for mandamus of a denial of a stay by Judge Albright in light of an instituted PGR (PGR2020-00065). READ MORE

On November 3, 2020, Unified Patents, together with CableLabs, filed a second amicus brief in the refiled Intel Corp. v. Fortress Investment Group LLC, et al., and took the opportunity to help educate the Court on Fortress' now-frequent practice of using high-interest recourse loans to acquire questionable patents for serial assertion. READ MORE

On May 1, 2019, Unified filed an amicus brief in Hulu, LLC v. Sound View Innovations, LLC, IPR2018-01039, urging the PTAB to clarify the standard used by PTAB panels to determine whether an asserted reference qualifies as a printed publication when deciding whether to institute trial in a post-grant proceeding. READ MORE

On March 11 Unified, joined by HP Inc. and Engine Advocacy, filed an amicus brief with the Federal Circuit in Affinity Labs of Texas, LLC v. Netflix to defend the constitutionality of the appointment of all PTAB administrative patent judges. READ MORE

The estoppel portion of the statute has engendered judicial and academic debate. IPRs have a distinct beginning and end. Thus, estoppel based on the grounds raised or that reasonably could have been raised “during” the IPR would appear to bar only what could have reasonably been raised once the IPR was instituted. READ MORE