Patent Office Boss Urges Court to Nix Challenge to His Powers

The US Patent and Trademark Office advanced a muscular vision of the agency head’s authority to render decisions on patent validity challenges without additional legal review in an appellate filing.

Director John Squires on Wednesday urged the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit to turn away Interactive Communications International Inc.'s appeal from his decision, which wiped out a the Patent Trial and Appeal Board ruling that invalidated as obvious a patent owned by InComm’s litigation opponent, Blackhawk Network Inc.

Squires in October reversed a decision by a panel of three administrative judges finding that Blackhawk’s US Patent No. 11,488,451—which describes a method for selling pre-printed online lottery tickets—was obvious.

A week later Squires re-filed the document, which took issue with what he saw as inconsistent statements by an InComm expert. The updated decision changed the word “reversing” to “vacating,” and both decisions included a sentence they did “not constitute a final written decision,” which by law are generally appealable.

Historically, decisions of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board over whether to take up a patent challenge have largely been insulated by statute from appellate review while the board’s merits rulings—called final written decisions—are appealable to the Federal Ciruict under a provision of the Patent Act.

Squires argued in his brief to the Federal Circuit that such appeals rights don’t apply to final written decisions of the board when there are “later determinations to deinstitute or terminate a previously instituted proceeding.”

The director’s brief matched testimony he gave during a House Judiciary Committee oversight hearing in March when Rep. Darrell Issa (R.-Cal.) specifically criticized Squires’ intervention in the InComm-Blackhawk case.

“There is wide discretion afforded, and I believe the discretion would include changing your mind,” Squires told Issa.

InComm argued in its opening brief that Squires was expanding his authority by issuing a decision on the merits normally subject to review at the Federal Circuit but labeling it otherwise.

“The Director seeks the unreviewable power” to weigh in on who should win on the merits of its challenge, InComm said, “after a full trial by merely declaring his decision is not a ‘final written decision.’”

Blackhawk, which filed its response brief the same day as Squires, agreed with the director that his latest ruling stripped the Federal Circuit of its jurisdiction to review the case.

Quinn Emanuel represents InComm. Blackhawk is represented by Baker & Hostetler. Squires is represented by the PTO Solicitor’s Office.

The case is Interactive Commc’ns Int’l Inc. v. Blackhawk Network Inc., Fed. Cir., 26-1136, brief of Dir. Squires filed 5/20/26.