News & Publications

This week, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit vacated the Federal Trade Commission's (FTC) Combatting Auto Retail Scams (CARS) rule. Industry groups had challenged the rule, arguing that: The FTC violated Section 18(b) of the FTC Act by failing to issue an advance notice of proposed rulemaking (ANPRM) before promulgating the CARS rule. The FTC arbitrarily and capriciously failed to articulate a reasoned basis for the rule. The FTC's cost-benefit analysis was arbitrary and [...]

The U.S. Supreme Court has once again been urged to revisit 35 U.S.C. § 101, the statute governing patent eligibility. Audio Evolution Diagnostics, Inc. (AED) filed a petition for writ of certiorari, challenging the Federal Circuit's summary affirmance under Rule 36 of a ruling that invalidated its patents under the Alice/Mayo framework. Should the SCOTUS take up the case, this presents an opportunity for the Court to clarify the boundaries of patent eligibility and address [...]

In June 2022, the Federal Circuit overturned a $2.7B judgment for the plaintiff in Centripetal Networks v. Cisco, based on the failure of the presiding judge to recuse himself after he learned that his wife owned stock in the defendant. Similar attempts to reverse judgments due to purported conflicts of interest soon followed—including one from plaintiff CellSpin Soft Inc. Early last year, Northern District of California Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers forcefully denied a motion to recuse in which [...]