Patent Office’s ‘Fintiv’ Shift Will Limit Validity Challenges

The US Patent and Trademark Office reinforced its pro-patentee posture this week, giving the agency’s director more power to turn away patent validity challenges under the auspices of boosting efficiency, attorneys said.

A Wednesday memo from Acting Director Coke Morgan Stewart splits decisions on whether to take up validity challenges into two steps. Discretionary considerations based largely on the progress of parallel litigation will be decided before the merits of the petition. The move effectively shifts the PTO director’s involvement, previously limited to reviews after Patent Trial and Appeal Board judges weighed in, to the beginning of the PTAB process. ...