Ethicon Endo-Surgery, Inc. v. Covidien LP
Addressing for the first time the issue of whether the same
panel of Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB or Board) may both
institute an inter partes review (IPR) and finally decide
its merits, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
affirmed the single panel authority of the Board as well as the
PTAB panel's finding that the challenged claims were obvious.
Ethicon Endo-Surgery, Inc. v. Covidien LP, Case No.
14-1771 (Fed. Cir., Jan. 13, 2016) (Dyk, J.) (Newman, J.,
dissenting as to single panel's authority to both institute and
decide).
Ethicon Endo-Surgery (the patent owner) owns a patent for a
surgical stapler. Covidien (the petitioner) challenged claims of
the patent in an IPR as being obvious over certain prior art. A
three-member panel of the Board decided to institute the IPR, and
that same panel later issued a final written decision finding the
challenged claims invalid for obviousness. The patent
