Close Enough - Structure-less Prior Art Found to be Enabling

Challenging the novelty of a patent or patent application often requires a showing that the invention was publicly disclosed prior to the filing date of the patent. The prior art disclosure rarely discusses the invention in the exact same words as used in the patent, so there is often a question of when the prior art sufficiently “discloses the invention” to invalidate the claims of the patent. The case of Silicon Laboratories, Inc. v. Cresta Technology Corporation, Case IPR2014-00809, (Final Written Decision, October 21, 2015) draws that line well for a particular claim term that was disclosed functionally in the prior art, but not physically.

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