Robertson v. Timmermans May 27, 2010
Posted by atharkhan in : IP Notes , add a commentOpinion: www.cafc.uscourts.gov/opinions/09-1222.pdf
Notes:
- Under 37 C.F.R. § 41.200(b), a PTO regulation governing claim construction in interference proceedings, a “claim shall be given its broadest reasonable construction in light of the specification of the application or patent in which it appears.”
- When a patent applicant copies claims from another application or patent to provoke an interference, and those claims are the subject of a written description challenge during the interference, which disclosure should be used to construe the claims? Our cases now clearly hold that “when a party challenges written description support for an interference count or the copied claim in an interference, the originating disclosure provides the meaning of the pertinent claim language.”
- In Agilent, we examined two prior decisions of this court, In re Spina, 975 F.2d 854 (Fed. Cir. 1992), and Rowe v. Dror, 112 F.3d 473 (Fed. Cir. 1997). Spina involved an appeal from an examiner’s rejection of a claim for lack of written description support. We held that the claim, which had been copied from an issued patent in an attempt to provoke an interference, should be “viewed in the context of the patent from which it was copied.” Rowe involved an interference in which claims copied from one party’s patent into the other party’s application were the subject of a motion for invalidity based on prior art. We held that the Spina rule did not apply, but instead the claims should be interpreted in light of their host disclosure, just as they would during ex parte prosecution.
- Agilent clarified that in interference proceedings, the Spina rule applies when a claim copied from another party’s patent or application is challenged for lack of written description requirement support under § 112, ¶ 1, and the Rowe rule applies when the copied claim’s validity under 35 U.S.C. § 102 or § 103 is challenged. That is, the Board must interpret the copied claim in view of the originating disclosure for a written description challenge, and the Board must interpret the copied claim in view of the host disclosure for a validity challenge based on prior art.
- Agilent also made clear that 37 C.F.R. § 41.200(b), under which a claim is always interpreted in view of the host disclosure, does not apply in an interference proceeding when one party makes a written description challenge to a claim that another party has copied in order to provoke the interference.
Recommendations for Baby Monitors May 22, 2010
Posted by atharkhan in : Personal , 6commentsAnyone have any recommendations for baby monitors? Or, at least some idea of what features you found the most useful?
Google TV May 20, 2010
Posted by atharkhan in : Tech , add a commentInteresting announcement by Google. Hopefully this means that I can get rid of the AppleTV which can only play Apple-approved formats.
Source: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/05/announcing-google-tv-tv-meets-web-web.html
To stay updated on Google TV developments, sign up at: https://services.google.com/fb/forms/googletvinfo/
