US Synthetic secures ITC exclusion order barring polycrystalline diamond compacts (PDCs)

Finnegan secured a decisive victory for client US Synthetic Corp. (USS) at the U.S. International Trade Commission in Investigation No. 337-TA-1236, a Section 337 case involving polycrystalline diamond compacts (PDCs) and articles containing the same. In the merits phase, the ALJ found that claims 1, 2, 11, 15, and 21 of U.S. Patent No. 10,508,502 were infringed, not invalid under 35 U.S.C. §§ 102, 103, or 112, and supported by the economic prong of the domestic-industry requirement. As the Federal Circuit later recognized, only the Commission’s initial § 101 ruling prevented a Section 337 violation finding on the ’502 patent.

Finnegan then secured a landmark precedential Federal Circuit win for USS that cleared the path to final relief. The Court reversed the Commission’s § 101 ruling and held that the ’502 claims are directed to a specific, non-abstract composition of matter—not an abstract idea—while also affirming the Commission’s rejection of respondents’ enablement challenge and remanding for further proceedings. Finnegan then successfully defeated Respondents’ efforts to obtain rehearing and a stay of the mandate, and returned the case to the Commission for completion of the ITC relief phase.

On remand, the Commission found a violation of Section 337. It held that respondents Iljin, SF Diamond, New Asia, IDS, Haimingrun, Juxin, CR Gems, Jingrui, and Wanlong imported or sold infringing products covered by claims 1, 2, 11, 15, and 21 of the ’502 patent, affirmed that USS satisfied the economic prong of domestic industry, and issued a limited exclusion order barring infringing PDCs and articles containing the same—including PDC cutters, drill bits including PDC cutters, and PDC bearings and bearing elements—from entering the United States. The result protects USS’s patented technology and blocks infringing products from the U.S. market.