Black and Decker wins appeal of IPR on its U.S. Patent No. 5,544,417, related to a string trimmer

Black & Decker won a reversal of a PTAB decision:


For the reasons stated in this opinion, we reverse
the Board’s decision that claims 16 and 17 would have been
obvious and affirm its decision that claims 7 and 10
would not have been obvious.




**There was an issue of PTAB's use of BRI, which did NOT
effect the outcome:


Claims of an expired patent are given
their ordinary and customary meaning in accordance with
our opinion in Phillips v. AWH Corp., 415 F.3d 1303 (Fed.
Cir. 2005) (en banc). 3
See In re Rambus Inc. , 69 4 F.3d 42, 46 (Fed. Cir. 2012).



**There was an issue of prosecution disclaimer that was
NOT addressed:


Moreover, we do not reach the
issue of prosecution disclaimer in resolving the parties’
appeals. We thus do not
address the Director’s arguments.



As to claims 16 and 17, the CAFC found PTAB failed
to provide articulated reasoning:


We agree that the Board failed to explain why a per-
son of ordinary skill in the art would “fixedly secure” the
motor in Mack. Our precedent requires that the Board
explain a rationale why a person of ordinary skill would
have modified Mack’s motor. See Ball Aerosol & Specialty
Container, Inc. v. Limited Brands, Inc., 555 F.3d 984, 993
(Fed. Cir. 2009) (explaining that the skilled artisan’s
motivation “should be made explicit”).

(...)

Our precedent required that the Board explain why one of skill
in the art would have adapted or replaced Mack’s motor mounting yoke
to ensure that the motor did not move relative to the motor mounting structure.
The Board did not do so



link: http://www.cafc.uscourts.gov/sites/default/files/opinions-orders/15-1646.Opinion.5-16-2016.1.PDF