Inter Partes Review Is Fast-Paced, Often Strategically Advantageous

The America Invents Act created new administrative trials for litigating patent invalidity issues before the USPTO’s Patent Trial and Appeal Board by inter partes review. IPR trials can be initiated by any person who is not the patent owner and not otherwise barred from filing an IPR petition on a given patent. The popularity of IPRs may reflect a recognition that an IPR proceeding can result in a stay of costly district court litigation and is an effective alternative to district court litigation for invalidating a patent. It can also can force the patent owner to make arguments to the PTAB in order to preserve validity that ultimately undermine the infringement case against the IPR petitioner’s product.