The Federal Circuit Revisits the Scope of Analogous Art
On August 14, 2026, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed a ruling made by the Patent Trial and Appeal Board that claims in U.S. Patent No. 11,470,243 were unpatentable over a combination of prior art references that included a non-patent literature reference authored by Ying-li Tian entitled "Evaluation of Face Resolution for Expression Analysis" ("Tian")
Be Aware of the Risks of Overreliance: A Brief Review of Ethics Violations Issued by the USPTO in 2026
The ethical standards set forth in the USPTO Rules of Professional Conduct, 37 C.F.R. § 11.101 bind all attorneys and registered patent agents who practice before the USPTO (practitioners). The ethical standards include fundamental ethical concepts such as: lying to and stealing from your clients or the USPTO is wrong, practitioners should not accept work that they cannot do competently, and conflicts of interest should be avoided. However, the way in which these rules are applied by the USPTO through the Office of Enrollment and Discipline (OED) can provide specific guidelines and salient advice to even the most diligent of practitioners.
G 1/25 (EPO): How Far Must Claims and the Description Really Align?
The Enlarged Board of Appeal of the European Patent Office (EPO) has just issued its decision G 1/25 ("Hydroponics"), addressing inconsistencies between the description and the claims of a European patent application, or a European patent, and what should be done about them.
Twenty-Four Hours to Withdraw: The UAE's New Anti-Commercial Fraud Regulation and What It Means for Brand Owners
Since August 13, 2026, a supplier in the UAE that receives an official notice about counterfeit goods has twenty-four hours to pull them from the market. The rule comes from Cabinet Resolution No. (107) of 2026, issued on July 13, 2026, as the Executive Regulation of Federal Decree-Law No. (42) of 2023 on Anti-Commercial Fraud. The Decree-Law has been in force since November 29, 2023, but it left the procedures and time limits for recalling goods to an executive regulation that arrived more than two and a half years later.
The $25 Million Blue-Washing Blunder: Wyland v. FIFA
When commercial property rights collide with statutory moral rights, which one wins? This is the question at the center of a federal lawsuit related to intellectual property, real estate law and sports entertainment.
When Is a Provisional Application's Filing Date the "Prior Art" Date of a Patent or Published Application?
In Dental Monitoring SAS v. Align Technology, Inc., the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit addressed the crucial question: under what circumstances can a patent or published application be assigned the earlier filing date of a provisional application for purposes of qualifying as prior art under AIA 35 U.S.C. § 102(a)(2) and § 102(d)(2). The court held that the provisional application must provide written description support under § 112(a) for at least one published claim of the corresponding reference before the reference is entitled to the earlier filing date of the provisional application. As a result, the court vacated the Patent Trial and Appeal Board's previous obviousness decision, thus rejecting the Board's broader standard of prior art determination.
AI Use at the USPTO
Artificial intelligence (AI) pervades many industries. As such, it is no surprise that under U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) director John A. Squires' direction, AI continues to pervade the USPTO to assist in pre-examination and examination processes of patent applications.
Did I Write That? Enanta and the Written Description Requirement
The recent decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Enanta Pharmaceuticals, Inc. v. Pfizer Inc., demonstrates the importance of fully complying with the written description requirement for patent applications and correctly capturing each aspect of an invention in an initial disclosure. A patent application lacking critical details of an invention may suffer a variety of consequences including loss of priority date and, consequently, invalidation of the granted patent in litigation.
SEP: New EPO Observatory Study Provides Greater Clarity on Determination of FRAND Licensing Rates
During the Euractiv event held on June 24, 2026, key findings on the study "Methodologies for FRAND determination: evidence from global case law" were discussed. The study is a result of a survey of court cases around the world involving the determination and assessment of Fair, Reasonable and Non-Discriminatory (FRAND) terms and conditions for the licensing of standard essential patents (SEPs). The survey was conducted by the EPO Observatory, a department of the EPO that analyzes market data in relation to patents, in collaboration with the consulting firm BRELA.
Supreme People's Court of China Interprets Application of Punitive Damages in Intellectual Property Infringement Civil Cases
On 20 April 2026, the Supreme People's Court of China ("SPC") issued the Judicial Interpretation of the Supreme People's Court on the Application of Punitive Damages in the Trial of Civil Disputes Involving Infringement of Intellectual Property Rights (Judicial Interpretation [2026] No. 7) ("2026 Interpretation"). The 2026 Interpretation came into force on 1 May 2026, simultaneously repealing the previous 2021 version (Judicial Interpretation [2021] No. 4) ("2021 Interpretation").
