JPTOS Publishes Article by MVS Attorney Kirk HartungDecember 1, 2011

The full document is available here: Claim Preambles Unnecessary Matters of Chance and Confusion. MVS Attorney Kirk Hartung had his article Claim Preambles: Unnecessary Matters of Chance and Confusion published by the Journal of the Patent and Trademark Office Society (JPTOS). � JPTOS Site Abstract: Whether a preamble of a patent claim con- stitutes a limitation to the claim has been an issue for more than 75 years. In the past 50 years, there has been much debate regarding claim preambles, and whether terminology in the preambles limits the scope of the claims. Most recently, a 2010 decision from the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit recognizes that the Court has struggled to make sense of when a preamble should be construed as limiting, and that the Court has not succeeded in articulating a clear and simple rule. Justice Dyk lamented that this lack of clarity as to whether a preamble should be construed as limited has lead to inconsistent case law, which one leading treatise has said it is ‘difficult to reconcile.’ The vague and confusing rule on pre- amble terminology has never been addressed by the U.S. Supreme Court or the Federal Circuit sitting en banc. The solution seems simple, and consistent with Supreme Court precedent from more than a century ago. As the U.S. Court of Claims declared more than 40 years ago, ‘The necessity for a sensible and ystematic approach to claim inter- pretation is axiomatic.’ The article can be read in its entirety here: Claim Preambles: Unnecessary Matters of Chance and Confusion (pdf)