{"id":1106,"date":"2016-08-09T14:26:06","date_gmt":"2016-08-09T18:26:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/?p=1106"},"modified":"2016-08-13T15:01:42","modified_gmt":"2016-08-13T19:01:42","slug":"bri-does-not-apply-if-patent-expires-any-time-during-reexamination-proceeding","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/?p=1106","title":{"rendered":"BRI Does Not Apply if Patent Expires Any Time During Reexamination Proceeding"},"content":{"rendered":"

In In Re CSB-System International, Inc.<\/em>, [2015-1832] (August 9, 2016), the Federal Circuit held that the PTAB erred in applying a broadest reasonable interpretation claim construction, instead of a Phillips claim construction, to claims that expired during the course of the ex parte reexamination, but nonetheless affirmed the rejection of claims as obvious under the correct, narrower, standard.<\/p>\n

The Federal Circuit said that\u00a0during\u00a0reexamination proceedings of unexpired patents,\u00a0however, the Board uses the broadest reasonable interpretation
\nconsistent with the specification standard, or\u00a0BRI. \u00a0The rationale for permitting
\nthis broader standard in reexaminations is that a\u00a0patent owner before the Patent and Trademark Office\u00a0with an unexpired patent may amend claims to\u00a0narrow their scope, negating any unfairness that may\u00a0otherwise result from adopting the BRI standard. \u00a0However,\u00a0when an expired patent is subject to\u00a0reexamination, the traditional Phillips<\/em> construction\u00a0standard attaches.<\/p>\n

In the instant case, the patent expired after the Examiner issued a final rejection but before consideration of the appeal by the PTAB. \u00a0The PTAB applied\u00a0BRI becaue the patent owner had the opportunity to amend its\u00a0patent claims while they were pending before the examiner\u00a0in the reexamination, as the patent had yet to expire.<\/p>\n

The Federal Circuit disagreed with the Board’s approach, stating\u00a0that when a patent\u00a0expires during a reexamination proceeding, the PTO\u00a0should thereafter apply the Phillips standard for claim\u00a0construction, even if this means that the Board applies a different standard than\u00a0the examiner.<\/p>\n

The Federal Circuit held that:<\/p>\n

BRI is not a monolithic standard\u00a0that the Board can use even after a patent expires.\u00a0Rather, consistent with our prior precedent and customary\u00a0practice, we reaffirm that once a patent expires, the\u00a0PTO should apply the Phillips standard for claim construction.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In In Re CSB-System International, Inc., [2015-1832] (August 9, 2016), the Federal Circuit held that the PTAB erred in applying a broadest reasonable interpretation claim construction, instead of a Phillips claim construction, to claims that expired during the course of … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22,30],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1106","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bri","category-reexamination"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1106","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1106"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1106\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1108,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1106\/revisions\/1108"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1106"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1106"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1106"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}