The Patent Trial and Appeal Board at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office on Tuesday, Nov. 8, denied two separate challenges to the patentability of a Purdue Research Foundation patent involving silicon carbide semiconductors.
US 7,498,633 covers groundbreaking technology invented by James Cooper, Professor Emeritus of Electrical and Computer Engineering in the Elmore Family School of Electrical and Computer Engineering in Purdue University’s College of Engineering, and his graduate student/postdoc Asmita Saha. The denied petitions were filed by STMicroelectronics and Wolfspeed in response to Purdue’s patent infringement lawsuits; they were an attempt to invalidate the patent and, thereby, stop the litigation.
All pending challenges on this patent before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office have been rejected. A previous challenge was denied in June 2022.
“This is another great victory for Purdue,” said Ken Waite, chief patent counsel and director of intellectual property at the Purdue Research Foundation Office of Technology Commercialization. “As with the previous action, the USPTO has once again affirmed the validity of the patent on Cooper’s and Saha’s work. These actions just underscore the strength of this patent and the value of the technology.
“Protecting Purdue University intellectual property and bringing that technology to the world is at the heart of our mission at OTC. We take our role as steward of these great inventions very seriously. As we have stated before, we follow the law throughout the process, and hold ourselves and others accountable.”
In the 2021 calendar year, Purdue Research Foundation received 169 patents from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, placing it sixth among all international institutions of higher education.