Patent Office Offers Guidance on Enablement After Amgen-Sanofi

US Patent and Trademark Office employees will continue using the same factors to determine whether applications meet patent law’s “enablement” requirement, following a string of US Supreme Court and Federal Circuit decisions, according to guidance set to be published in the Federal Register Wednesday.

The high court’s Amgen v. Sanofi decision left intact a 1988 test developed by the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in In re Wands, which directs patent examiners and judges to consider certain factors to determine whether a patent provides sufficient information to allow skilled persons to replicate the invention when “undue ...