ABB Inc. v. ROY-G-BIV Corp.
In the past several months, decisions have been rendered in the
first wave of inter partes reviews filed under the
American Invents Act (AIA). The early IPR decisions of the
Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) have, in general, not been
kind to patent owners, with most challenged claims being
cancelled. Now, in two related inter partes review (IPR)
proceedings, the PTAB found for the patent owner on all grounds of
review. ABB Inc. v. ROY-G-BIV Corp., Cases
IPR2013-00036 and IPR2013-00282, IPR2013-00074 and IPR2013-00286
(PTAB, Apr. 11, 2014) (Giannetti, APJ.).
ABB filed two separate petitions for review of each of two
ROY-G-BIV owned patents. ROY-G-BIV had earlier asserted each
against ABB. The patents are both directed to essentially the same
technology: a system for facilitating the creation of
hardware-independent motion control software. The patents
describe a high-level motion control application programming
interface (API)
