NPE Activity Catches Up to 1H 2021 Due to Q2 Boost
August 3, 2022
For the first half of 2022, NPE activity was slightly ahead of that same period last year by 2%, with 1,203 defendants added to patent litigation campaigns—broadly in line with the trend seen since 2018. While Q1 2022 saw 10% less litigat...
Read full postWest Texas Stays on Top as Senate Confirms Delaware Nominee for Judge Stark’s Seat
July 27, 2022
In Q1 2022, the Western District of Texas was yet again the most popular district for all patent litigation and for litigation filed by NPEs. The District of Delaware was the top district for operating company litigation and held second pla...
Read full postNHK-Fintiv Denials Have Declined Dramatically, Says USPTO Study
July 20, 2022
USPTO Director Kathi Vidal recently kicked off a push to reform the Patent Trial and Appeal Board’s (PTAB’s) use of discretionary denials based on parallel litigation, limiting the application of the NHK-Fintiv rule in a new interim gui...
Read full postJudge Albright, Again the Nation’s Top Patent Judge in Q2, Gets Further Pushback from Federal Circuit
July 13, 2022
The top judge in Q2 2022 was Western District of Texas Judge Alan D. Albright, with 25% of new litigation filed in his courtroom. Judge Albright—who has gone to great lengths to attract patent litigation, drawing the ire of Congress in th...
Read full postLitigants Wielding Alice Succeed More Often When Challenging Patents Asserted by NPEs
June 29, 2022
RPX data on patent eligibility show that defendants succeed more often against NPEs when arguing that patents asserted against them are invalid under Alice, the Supreme Court’s June 2014 ruling on patent eligibility. Following that decisi...
Read full postAnticounterfeit Litigation Accounted for a Sizable Share of Patent Assertion Activity in Q1
June 22, 2022
RPX’s latest quarterly report includes an analysis of patent litigation filed by operating companies—revealing that while such activity was up in Q1 2022 compared to a slow quarter one year ago, nearly all of that increase was attributa...
Read full postAlice Remains in Narrowed State as Supreme Court Considers Reviewing American Axle
June 15, 2022
The US Solicitor General recently urged the Supreme Court to review the Federal Circuit’s controversial decision in American Axle, a divided ruling that invalidated a mechanical invention for claiming a natural law—sparking further deba...
Read full postAIA Review Institution Rates Level Out as Parties Stipulate Around NHK-Fintiv
June 8, 2022
The Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) instituted trial in 62% of the America Invents Act (AIA) review petitions addressed in the first quarter of 2022. Last year the institution rate was 58.7%, a slight increase from 2020’s 58.2% but s...
Read full postE-Commerce and Software Saw the Most NPE Activity in Q1 2022, with Familiar Plaintiffs and Patents
May 25, 2022
The top market sector for NPE litigation in Q1 2022 was E-Commerce and Software, accounting for more than a quarter of all NPE activity. Networking saw the second most NPE assertions in the first quarter, followed closely by Consumer Electr...
Read full postPTAB Petitions Held Steady in Q1 as Federal Circuit Focused on IPR Estoppel
May 18, 2022
In the first quarter of 2022, 336 petitions for America Invents Act (AIA) review were filed with the PTAB, including 328 petitions for inter partes review (IPR) and eight petitions for post-grant review (PGR). Filings in Q1 were essentially...
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