Can you imagine if a jury was able to decide the SecureAuth Alice 101 challenge instead of Judge Kronstadt at the District Court level. He dismissed the case early without writing ANY factual findings about the patents because he ruled they were non-inventive based on Alice 35/101. The three Appeal judges will no doubt review that SFOR patents have been validated by the Patent Trial & Appeal Board (PTAB) TWICE and all 50+ challenged claims have been validated AS BEING INVENTIVE. They will also consider the fact that three SFOR competitors filed the PTAB challenge in the hopes of invalidating SFOR patents so that they did not have to come to terms with having to settle on damages with SFOR.
What a victory for SFOR when the Supreme Court last month in April 2018 ruled in favor of PTAB patent reviews stating that the Patent Review Board has the Constitutional authority to rule on patent eligibility!!!!
Now, in addition to the PTAB victory, Federal Circuit courts (often used for Appeals) have made considering a patent invalid under Alice 35/101 much more difficult. Quote from ZPaul's posted article:
'The Federal Circuit found that a finding of patent eligibility under Section 101 and the Alice ruling involve "factual issues." This means that lower district courts will have a more difficult time resolving Section 101 cases at the summary judgment stage because these factual issues are something that require a jury to decide.
This ruling may drastically change how we look at Section 101 challenges because we have yet to see how a jury will decide such an issue. Over the past four years since the Alice ruling, judges, attorneys, and clients have all been trying to figure out the bounds of Section 101 for business methods and software inventions. With this ruling, it is as if the slate has been wiped clean and we will have to analyze the issues in a different light because the decision may come down to the jury to decide as opposed to the judge'.
This is exactly what happened in the SFOR/SecureAuth patent case. There were not any 'factual issues' or discoveries written into the final judgement during the District Court process in November 2017. Judge Kronstadt was willing to provide a summary judgement on the case for early Alice 35/101 dismissal without any factual issues being reviewed to the dismay of Ropes & Gray. Ropes & Gray revealed as much in their March 26, 2018 Appeal Brief. The District Judge was willing to rule this way even though SFOR was just a few weeks removed from SFOR's complete (and rare) PTAB victory.
Was it possible that SecureAuth, Knobbe Martins (SA's Lawfirm) and even Judge Kronstadt were hoping for a favorable ruling in April 2018 when the Supreme Court case involving whether the PTAB has the constitutional right to judge whether patents are valid or not would be ruled on? If so...they lost.
I believe they will find out how badly they lost in the next couple of weeks when the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals slam dunks this case by ruling in SFOR's favor. They will simply be ruling in line with the Supreme Court, The Patent Trial & Appeal Board (TWICE) and Microsoft's legal teams who settled with SFOR back in 2016 because they saw no other way to end the dispute.
What a victory for SFOR when the Supreme Court last month in April 2018 ruled in favor of PTAB patent reviews stating that the Patent Review Board has the Constitutional authority to rule on patent eligibility!!!!
Now, in addition to the PTAB victory, Federal Circuit courts (often used for Appeals) have made considering a patent invalid under Alice 35/101 much more difficult. Quote from ZPaul's posted article:
'The Federal Circuit found that a finding of patent eligibility under Section 101 and the Alice ruling involve "factual issues." This means that lower district courts will have a more difficult time resolving Section 101 cases at the summary judgment stage because these factual issues are something that require a jury to decide.
This ruling may drastically change how we look at Section 101 challenges because we have yet to see how a jury will decide such an issue. Over the past four years since the Alice ruling, judges, attorneys, and clients have all been trying to figure out the bounds of Section 101 for business methods and software inventions. With this ruling, it is as if the slate has been wiped clean and we will have to analyze the issues in a different light because the decision may come down to the jury to decide as opposed to the judge'.
This is exactly what happened in the SFOR/SecureAuth patent case. There were not any 'factual issues' or discoveries written into the final judgement during the District Court process in November 2017. Judge Kronstadt was willing to provide a summary judgement on the case for early Alice 35/101 dismissal without any factual issues being reviewed to the dismay of Ropes & Gray. Ropes & Gray revealed as much in their March 26, 2018 Appeal Brief. The District Judge was willing to rule this way even though SFOR was just a few weeks removed from SFOR's complete (and rare) PTAB victory.
Was it possible that SecureAuth, Knobbe Martins (SA's Lawfirm) and even Judge Kronstadt were hoping for a favorable ruling in April 2018 when the Supreme Court case involving whether the PTAB has the constitutional right to judge whether patents are valid or not would be ruled on? If so...they lost.
I believe they will find out how badly they lost in the next couple of weeks when the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals slam dunks this case by ruling in SFOR's favor. They will simply be ruling in line with the Supreme Court, The Patent Trial & Appeal Board (TWICE) and Microsoft's legal teams who settled with SFOR back in 2016 because they saw no other way to end the dispute.
16
