A series of proposed changes restricting access to American Inventions Act post-grant proceedings before the Board of Patent Trial and Appeals run contrary to the intent of Congress and create unnecessary obstacles for companies that are sued by entities for weak patents that should never have been issued, the American Bankers Association and six trade associations from the financial and service sectors recently wrote in a letter to the US Patent and Trademark Office.. The associations, which work collectively as the Quality Patent Coalition, said the proposed changes would add numerous requirements for filers that were not adopted by Congress and create a framework that would make discretionary denial routine and ubiquitous, protecting claims that are unlikely to be patentable. review.
In April, the USPTO issued an advance notice of rulemaking seeking public input on proposed changes to institutions’ discretionary practices, petition word limits, and settlement practices for filing proceedings. the ia. The 2011 law made several substantive changes to the nation’s patent system, including the creation of the trial and appeal board, to provide a less expensive alternative to district court litigation to resolve patent issues. However, the coalition said the proposal exceeds the authority of the agency head and departs from the text of the AIA, along with the intent of Congress, by placing new limits on post-award proceedings that would reduce their efficiency and effectiveness. .
The coalition expressed concern that the proposal would lead companies to divert resources best spent considering the validity of patent claims into endless disputes over threshold issues related to discretionary denial. Furthermore, the proposal would create ample opportunities for gambling. For example, parties could take advantage of many of the proposals to obtain a discretionary denial and protect patents from post-grant review.