Apple Inc. v. WeCrevention, Inc.
Patent Trial and Appeal Board
Holding
The Director denied institution of Apple’s IPR petitions against WeCrevention’s high-speed memory chip module patents under discretionary § 314(a), applying Revvo and Infineon rather than reaching the prior-art merits. The denial rested on Apple’s unexplained inconsistent claim-construction positions between the PTAB and district court—particularly whether the preamble is limiting and whether “input/output unit” is a § 112(f) limitation with adequate corresponding structure.
Why It Matters
The decision reinforces a Director-review trend requiring petitioners to take a single, consistent claim-construction position across PTAB and district court or provide a persuasive explanation for any divergence. Discretionary denial can turn on litigation-position inconsistency even without a conventional NHK-Fintiv trial-date or investment analysis.
- Written description, enablement and indefiniteness (§ 112) →
- Anticipation and prior art (§ 102) →
- Obviousness (§ 103) →
- Claim construction →
- PTAB discretionary denial →
- PTAB Director Review →
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