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Patent/PTAB Litigation Changes in Senator Leahy’s “Restoring the America Invents Act”
In 2011, Congress passed the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act (the “AIA”), implementing the most significant reformation to the U.S. patent system in over fifty years. Among the many changes of the AIA was the creation of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (the “PTAB”). The PTAB serves as the judicial body of the United States Patent and Trademark Office (the “USPTO”) that adjudicates AIA trial proceedings of challenged patents. A decade later, one of the AIA’s namesakes, Senator Patrick Leahy – VT (D), is seeking to recalibrate practices that have evolved due to recent court decisions and PTAB directives that he sees as contrary to goals of the original AIA legislation. As such, Senator Leahy has introduced a new bill entitled the “Restoring the America Invents Act.”