USPTO Finds That “Publically Accessible” Requirement for Prior Art Was Not Met for Documents Made Available at Members-Only Meeting

On October 26, 2016, the PTAB concluded in an IPR filed by GoPro, Inc. against Contour IP Holding LLC that the plaintiff failed to demonstrate that the claims at issue were unpatentable. IPR (IPR2015-01080). GoPro asserted that the claims at issue were unpatentable in view of a GoPro product catalog that included information for a digital video camera. GoPro argued that there are two standards concerning accessibility: (1) accessible to “the public interested in the art,” and (2) accessible to “persons interested and ordinarily skilled in the art.” Contour argued that a reference is ‘publicly accessible’ upon a showing that the document was disseminated or otherwise made available to the extent that persons interested and ordinarily skilled in the subject matter or art exercising reasonable diligence, can locate it. The PTAB concluded otherwise:

"[W]e apply the following standard, recently enunciated by the Federal Circuit, for determining whether the GoPro Catalog is a prior art printed publication: “A reference will be considered publicly accessible if it was ‘disseminated or otherwise made available to the extent that persons interested and ordinarily skilled in the subject matter or art exercising reasonable diligence, can locate it.’” Blue Calypso, 815 F.3d at 1348 (citing Kyocera Wireless Corp. v. ITC, 545 F.3d 1340, 1350 (Fed. Cir. 2008)).