The Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) recently issued an order that mandates parties to alert it to any relevant developments in parallel litigation promptly. The action implements a new agency policy that if the PTAB is considering claims that have already been adjudicated before a federal court and the board reaches a decision that is different than the prior finding, judges must explain why a different outcome is reasonable.
“If you’ve got a decision from a court on a related case and it helped you, then you have every incentive to notify the board of that decision,” Bracewell’s Kit Crumbley, a former administrative patent judge, told IAM.
“There wasn’t anything preventing parties from doing that. What’s new is this creates an obligation to do it within a certain period of time. … Since there was no obligation to let the board know about that earlier, the board couldn’t penalize you for not coming forward earlier. Now, some penalty can be imposed.”
