In a first-of-its-kind ruling, the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) invalidated two livestock valuation patents in post-grant review under the America Invents Act. The PTAB found the American Simmental Association (ASA), a national cattle breed industry group, had shown two patents claimed abstract ideas and that certain claims in one patent were also obvious. ASA was represented by Mike Annis, partner in the Food & Agribusiness group, and Dan Cohn and Sam Digirolamo, both partners in the firm's Technology, Manufacturing & Transportation group.
“We couldn’t be more pleased,” Cohn said. “These two patents were directed to nothing more than the use of a generic computer in a generic fashion to provide calculations based upon an aggregation of information. The technology was clearly non-patentable under the Supreme Court’s recent precedent.”