Activity Tracking Devices: Commission Affirms Invalidity Determination Under Section 101

On April 4, 2016, the Commission issued a quick affirmance of Judge Dee Lord's Initial Determination ("ID") finding two patents asserted in Certain Activity Tracking Devices, Systems, and Components Thereof, Inv. No. 337-TA-963, invalid under Section 101.

As we noted in an earlier post, Judge Lord's March 3rd ID marked the first time since the Supreme Court's Alice decision in 2014 that any Commission Judge had found claims invalid for failure to claim patentable subject matter. Indeed, Judge Lord noted in her ID that the full Commission had not addressed Section 101 issues since Alice. As discussed in our prior post, Judge Lord granted respondents' motion for summary determination of invalidity, which was filed after claim construction had been completed. The Commission reviewed and affirmed Judge Lord's determination without substantial comment on its reasoning. The Commission's only modification of the ID was to amend a statement Judge Lord had made regarding