CAFC Upholds Preliminary Injunction Despite Unpatentability Ruling Of PTAB

This week in Tinnus Enterprises LLC v. Telebrands Corp. (Moore, Wallach and Stoll), the Federal Circuit upheld the grant of a preliminary injunction by the Eastern District of Texas, despite a PTAB Final Written Decision finding the claims at issue to be indefinite. While the petitioner's failure to directly raise the PTAB's grounds as a basis to deny the preliminary injunction may have partially contributed to the outcome, it also appears that the Federal Circuit will not always give deference to the PTAB when it disagrees with their findings.The case involved Tinnus' U.S. Patent No. 9,051,066, on a water-balloon filling device designed to fill multiple water balloons as the same time. Tinnus sued Telebrands shortly after its patent issued and sought a preliminary injunction. Telebrands opposed the injunction on the basis that the asserted claims were indefinite and obvious. Telebrands also petitions for Post-Grant Review on the same grounds.