Federal circuit clarifies requirements for a prior art
reference's entitlement to the filing date of a provisional
application to which it claims priority
On March 24, 2025, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal
Circuit (“CAFC”) issued an opinion vacating and
remanding a decision of the U.S. Patent Trial and Appeal Board (the
“Board”) that a published patent application
(“Lettich”) qualified as prior art to a pending
application, U.S. Patent Application No. 11/005,678 (the
“'168 Application”), because the Board's
analysis as to Lettich's prior art status was incomplete. In
re Riggs, No. 22-1945, __ F.4th ___ (Fed. Cir. Mar. 24, 2025).
The '168 Application, which is directed to logistics
systems and methods for the transportation of goods from various
shippers by various carriers across different modes of transport
(e.g., rail, truck, ship, or air), has a priority date of July 28,
2000. During original prosecution, the patent Examiner rejected the
'168
