FEDS ASK JUSTICES TO PASS ON DNA TEST PATENT CASE INVOLVING PRIORITY DATES

摘要

The federal government is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to ignore a DNA test maker's challenge to the way the Patent and Trademark Office has treated the priority dates of patent applications for prior art purposes. See Ariosa Diagnostics Inc. v. Illumina Inc., No. 18-109, amicus brief filed, 2019 WL 2209255 (U.S. May 21, 2019). Ariosa Diagnostics Inc., maker of Harmony prenatal DNA tests, says the priority date of a patent application it submitted in an inter partes review proceeding as prior art should have invalidated Illumina Inc.'s patent, but U.S. Solicitor General Noel J. Francisco disagrees.