News & Publications

The final rule replaces the "broadest reasonable interpretation" standard with the federal court claim construction standard, also known as the Phillips standard, that is used to construe a claim in a civil action under 35 U.S.C. § 282(b).

On September 10, 2018, the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit upheld the Patent Trial and Appeal Board’s decision to invalidate IXI IP LLC’s patent related to sharing an internet connection over Bluetooth because it’s obvious in light of prior inventions.

Johns Manville Corp.’s bid for a retrial in a trade secrets case against competing Knauf Insulation LLC was denied by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit because Knauf met the terms of an agreement over how it used the opinion of its counsel.

The US Patent and Trademark Office announced that a migration tool is now available for existing PKI digital certificate holders (registered practitioners and independent inventors) to link their USPTO.gov accounts to their current PKI digital certificates.

The Federal Circuit affirmed the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board’s (TTAB) decision to refuse to register “Detroit Athletic Co.” for sports apparel because the mark would likely cause confusion with a long-standing private social club

The Office of the United States Trade Representative announced that the United States, Mexico, and Canada reached an agreement to “modernize the 24-year-old NAFTA into a 21st century, high-standard agreement."

The Patent Trial and Appeal Board has substantially revised its Standard Operating Procedures (“SOPs”) regarding precedential and informative decisions (SOP2).

The Patent Trial and Appeal Board has substantially revised its Standard Operating Procedures (“SOPs”) regarding paneling of matters before the PTAB (SOP1).

The United States Patent and Trademark Office has issued a new examination guide, “Changes to Procedures Regarding Certain Documents.”

Sunday, Sept. 23, is the last day to sign up for the Nov. 6-8 STEPP Agent/Attorney 3-Day Course. Open to the public as part of the USPTO’s Stakeholder Training on Examination Practice and Procedure (STEPP) program, the course will be held at the Chicago-Kent College of Law, Illinois Institute of Technology.