Washington, DC principal Nick Matich was extensively quoted in relation to USPTO Director Kathi Vidal’s high-profile dismissal of petitioner OpenSky Industries LLC from an IPR involving patent owner VLSI and lead petitioner Intel. He said, “There’s been widespread agreement in the IP world that the OpenSky petition is abusive and should not be tolerated. What there’s less consensus on is precisely what made it so offensive. Vidal takes the view that the problem with the petition was Open Sky’s motives, that Open Sky never intended to litigate to conclusion and just wanted a payment from Intel or VLSI. She’s right that initiating a legal proceeding on false pretenses is bad, but I think she misses the larger picture. Allowing anyone or everyone to challenge a patent destabilizes the patent system. Vidal is letting Intel take over the petition, even though Intel couldn’t itself file one and Intel already had the chance to challenge the patent, once in court and once previously at the PTAB.
Now Intel gets a third chance. That’s unfair and is the kind of outcome that disincentivizes inventors from trusting the patent system with their inventions.”
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