The entire Federal Circuit has agreed to rehear the PTO appeal in Tafas v. Doll over the PTO’s rule-making authority. A Federal Circuit panel decided in March that the PTO did have the authority to limit the number of claims in patent applications, but its proposed limitations on the number of continuation applications that can be filed conflicted with the patent statute and was invalid.
This seems to be a surprising turn of events given the current status of the proceedings. Hopefully, the Federal Circuit will take a much closer look at the PTO’s rule-making authority and the implications of any new rules on patent practice.
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