Drafting Software Patents to Survive Section 101 and AIA Challenges
Anticipating and Minimizing the Risk of 101 Rejections, Recent Court Guidance
Course Details
- smart_display Format
On-Demand
- signal_cellular_alt Difficulty Level
Intermediate
- work Practice Area
Patent
- event Date
Thursday, April 3, 2025
- schedule Time
1:00 p.m. ET./10:00 a.m. PT
- timer Program Length
90 minutes
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This 90-minute webinar is eligible in most states for 1.5 CLE credits.
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This CLE course will guide patent practitioners to draft their patent applications to overcome Section 101 challenges during prosecution, litigation, and AIA reviews. This panel has decades of experience in Section 101.
Mr. Bahr specializes in all areas of patent practice. He previously served as the Deputy Commissioner for Patent Examination Policy at the USPTO. During his distinguished career at the USPTO, he was involved in nearly all patent-related rulemaking since 1995. His involvement in patent rulemaking includes the changes to implement the American Inventors Protection Act of 1999 and the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act. He provided administrative oversight and direction for the activities of the Office of Petitions, Office of Patent Legal Administration, Office of Patent Quality Assurance, Central Reexamination Unit, and Manual of Patent Examining Procedure staff during his tenure at the USPTO.
Mr. Kiklis focuses on PTAB litigation as well as district court patent litigation. He also handles Federal Circuit appeals from his cases. With an extensive background in computer science, his technological focus is on software patent matters. Mr. Kiklis frequently handles high stakes matters, having been involved in several cases in which over $1 billion was at stake.
Patent eligibility in the context of software-related inventions is not always apparent. Patent practitioners and applicants have struggled since the Supreme Court's decision in Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank Int’l (2014) to understand what qualifies as an abstract idea.
Recent Federal Circuit decisions on software-related claims have provided more guidance on patent eligibility. Understanding the court's rationale in recent decisions will increase the likelihood that a patent drafter's claims will pass step one or two of the Alice patent-eligibility test.
Counsel must carefully draft their specifications and claims to increase the likelihood of the patent surviving at the district court as well as during a post-grant review.
Listen as our authoritative panel of patent attorneys reviews the courts' guidance in the post-Alice decisions. The panel will offer their perspectives and experiences concerning patent applications/claims, including anticipating Section 101 rejections when drafting the claims.
- Challenges in drafting software patents
- Guidance from recent decisions
- Best practices for drafting software patent applications
- Benefits of claimed inventions
- Providing details in the specification
- Drafting claims to survive 101
The panel will review these and other key issues:
- What are the hurdles for patent counsel to demonstrate a software-related claim is not abstract?
- How can patent practitioners pass Alice's step two if an abstract idea is identified?
- What guidance have the courts provided in recent decisions concerning patent eligibility for software-related inventions?
- What best practices should counsel use to help software-related inventions survive 101 challenges?
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