Failure To Clearly List Intermediate Applications Breaks Chain Of Priority

Medtronic CoreValve, LLC v. Edwards Lifesciences Corp.

Addressing the issue of whether a failure to specifically reference each earlier filed patent applications will result in a loss of claim of priority to the omitted application, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed a summary judgment of anticipation based on intervening prior art as a consequence of the priority date to which the asserted claims were entitled.  The Court concluded that the chain of priority for the asserted claims was broken because the priority claims of two parent applications omitted reference to earlier parent applications, so that the flawed parent applications failed to make "specific reference" to earlier filed applications as required by 35 U.S.C. § 120.  Medtronic CoreValve, LLC v. Edwards Lifesciences Corp., Case No.13-1117 (Fed. Cir., Jan. 22, 2014) (Prost, J.).