Inventors Misled USPTO in Patent Process, Fed. Cir. Says
Written March 9, 2020
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on March 2, 2020, held that two inventors misinformed the US Patent and Trademark Office with the help of Cantor Colburn LLP. GS Cleantech Corp. v. Adkins Energy LLC, Fed. Cir., No. 16-2231, 3/2/20. For instance, the inventors withheld information from the USPTO to avoid the Patent Act’s on-sale bar, and threatened another company in order to get its support for their application, the court said. An Indiana federal court found the patents invalid in a related infringement case. After the ruling, the court found that the inventors received the patents through inequitable conduct and displayed a “complete lack of regard for their duty to the USPTO.” The Federal Circuit affirmed, finding both that the inventors offered the invention for sale, and that the invention was ready for patenting, more than one year before the application was filed.