Federal Circuit rejects RPI arguments against Unified
On July 28, 2020, in the first appeal to be decided by the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on real party in interest (RPI) related to one of Unified’s over 200 PTAB challenges, the Federal Circuit rejected Fall Line Patents, LLC arguments that (1) RPI determinations were reviewable on appeal after Thryv, and also rejected (2) that Arthrex was wrongly decided. They then remanded for a new Board panel decision, in line with Arthrex. This appeal came after the PTAB issued a final written decision against Fall Line holding all challenged claims unpatentable.
Judge O'Malley noted that Thryv precluded judicial review of the PTAB’s institution-based RPI determinations. Notably, Fall Line did not appeal the merits of the Board's validity decision. Unified was represented by James Barney and Daniel Cooley of Finnegan, and by in-house counsel, Jonathan Stroud and Ashraf Fawzy.
See Fall Line Patents, LLC v. Unified Patents for the decision.