The U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in SAS Institute v. Iancu, ruling that the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) must decide the validity of all challenged claims in America Invents Act (AIA) reviews, rather than selecting a subset of challenged claims to rule. While the decision could simplify certain patent disputes, questions still arise for the PTAB and for litigants. Law360 contacted Finnegan partner Josh Goldberg for his thoughts on the decision.
The decision will impact the PTAB's workload, with practitioners suggesting that the patent office may hire additional PTAB judges to help deal with the increase or the PTAB could start issuing less detailed decisions. Josh said, "Given this ruling and the court’s specific reference to their binary choice, it’s possible the board could stop issuing lengthy institution decisions and instead just have one word—it’s instituted or it’s not instituted—and that’s it."
