Reprinted with permission from the October 1, 2020 issue of The Intellectual Property Strategist, ALM Media, LLC.

I. INTRODUCTION

During patent prosecution before the USPTO, applicant and examiner can become entrenched in conflicting positions on subject matter eligibility. Appeal to the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) could clear prosecution impasse. However, Alice related issues taken to the PTAB are not necessarily the Alice related issues decided by the PTAB.
Continue Reading Alice and Incongruity in PTAB Appeals

Patent attorneys are often asked the question: “Is my idea patentable?”  Often the idea is related to software or business methods.  Well-known business methods include Amazon’s “1-click shopping” and Priceline’s “reverse auction.”  In the new digital economy, innovative software and business method models have given rise to new very successful companies such as LinkedIn, Uber, and Airbnb.  As important software and business method inventions are in the new digital economy, it is often unclear whether they can be patented.  This uncertainty is largely due to a legal rule that “abstract ideas” are not eligible for patent protection.  This rule originates from a long line of U.S. Supreme Court cases, with Alice Corporation v. CLS Bank International, decided in June of 2014, being the most recent and influential of these cases.  The basic rationale for the rule is a concern over so-called “preemption” of abstract ideas.  That is to say abstract ideas are the basic building blocks of science and industry, and allowing patents to monopolize abstract ideas can preempt the use of such basic building blocks.
Continue Reading Software and Business Method Inventions After Alice