"In his last appeal to the Federal Circuit, Hyatt argued that prosecution laches is not available in Section 145 proceedings because it is inconsistent with the Patent Act of 1952, as confirmed by recent U.S. Supreme Court rulings in Petrella v. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (2014) and SCA Hygiene Products Aktiebolag v. First Quality Baby Products (2017)."
"The Federal Circuit's presumption that any patent taking more than six years to prosecute is presumptively unenforceable places the burden on patent owners to demonstrate as a threshold matter that the length of prosecution was reasonable. The presumption that any prosecution exceeding six years makes a patent presumptively unenforceable functionally turns Section 282 on its head, contorting the presumption of validity into a presumption of unenforceability."
"The Court is more likely to grant certiorari when it sees broad-based concern about an issue. That is where the patent community comes in."
Gil Hyatt's ongoing legal battle now focuses on prosecution laches—whether this doctrine is valid in patent prosecution proceedings. Hyatt contends that prosecution laches contradicts the Patent Act of 1952 and recent Supreme Court decisions in Petrella and SCA Hygiene Products, which established that laches cannot apply when statutory timeframes govern action. The Federal Circuit rejected this argument, instead adopting a presumption that patents taking over six years to prosecute are presumptively unenforceable, placing the burden on patent owners to justify prosecution length. This presumption effectively reverses the statutory presumption of patent validity. Hyatt's certiorari petition to the Supreme Court presents an opportunity to clarify whether prosecution laches exists and to reset patent law on this issue.
#prosecution-laches #patent-law #supreme-court-certiorari #patent-validity-presumption #federal-circuit
Read at IPWatchdog.com | Patents & Intellectual Property Law
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