After over a 12 months and a half on the helm of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Workplace (USPTO), Director Kathi Vidal has made important and lasting impacts on the Patent Trial and Enchantment Board (PTAB) by means of a wide range of completely different actions, together with Director Critiques, issuing steering, designating further circumstances as precedential, issuing sanctions sua sponte, and returning establishment charges to 2016 ranges. All indicators level to continuation of further modifications below her continued management, primarily based on numerous proposed rulemaking bulletins and the USPTO’s present Strategic Plan.
Maybe the biggest impression that Director Vidal has had upon the PTAB is has been by way of Director Critiques. The U.S. Supreme Courtroom’s resolution in United States v. Arthrex, Inc., 141 S.Ct. 1970 (2021), mandated Director Critiques to right what the case deemed procedural defects in the best way that administrative patent judges are appointed to the PTAB. Though the interim Director Overview process was put in place earlier than Director Vidal was in workplace, previous to her tenure solely 5 out of the 189 requests filed had been granted, in line with PTAB-published statistics. In response to those self same statistics, below Director Vidal a complete of 41 Director Critiques have been issued as of this writing, with most being issued sua sponte by the Director and only a handful of them ensuing from events’ requests for Director Overview. Thus, Director Vidal has taken severely the mandate of the Arthrex case and has been a really energetic in clarifying PTAB procedures and precedent by way of sua sponte Director Critiques.
