Intellectual Ventures Fails to Revive Software Patents

By Peter Leung, Bloomberg BNA

Intellectual Ventures I LLC couldn’t convince a federal appeals court today to resurrect several patents used to sue Capital One Financial Corp. and Erie Indemnity Co.

In two separate cases, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed lower court rulings that several of IV’s patents were invalid because they covered unpatentable subject matter.

The cases reflect the continuing difficulty of defending software-related patents from validity challenges. Critics say U.S. patent law has become unfairly stacked against inventors, while others say the law is doing what it is supposed to—preventing patent assertion entities ...