No Basis For Broad Exclusion Of Inventor Testimony

The Board has broad discretion to determine how much weight should be given to inventor testimony, but as long as the testimony does not relate to the inventor's opinion about the meaning of a claim term, there is no basis for broadly excluding all inventor testimony. In Semiconductor Components Indus. LLC v. Power Integrations, Inc., IPR2018-01815, the Petitioner sought admission of prior deposition testimony of one of the named inventors of the challenged patent. The Petitioner argued that the testimony was not available at the time of filing of the Petition, and that good cause for admission existed because the testimony contradicted the Patent Owner's proposed construction of a certain limitation in the claims, as well as its analysis of the prior art. In response, the Patent Owner argued that the testimony was both irrelevant to claim construction, and was not inconsistent with its position.