Roadshow Announced for Detroit Region

The Patent Trial & Appeal Board (PTAB) has announced Detroit Region Roadshows from November 5-19, 2014, focused on the AIA trials. The PTAB will visit Detroit, Chicago, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Minneapolis, and Milwaukee for half-day, afternoon programs. 

The roadshows are designed to be interactive, including audience participation in an educational game show (which couldn’t possibly be any geekier unless they required everyone to dress in Star Wars costumes) as well as a hands-on workshop. For the workshop, the audience will work in teams to review and discuss a mock scenario in which a petitioner wishes to assert a challenge against a patent. The teams will discuss which type of petition to file and what issues might arise from both the petitioner’s and patent owner’s perspectives. Topics of discussion will include bars to filing, real party-in-interest and joinder considerations, and claim construction. The teams likewise will decide whether to institute, and if so, on what grounds and for which claims. Several PTAB judges will facilitate the workshop discussion with one assigned to each team. In Detroit, the PTAB will host an actual AIA Trial Hearing in lieu of the workshop. The dates are noted below:

Detroit, MI Nov. 5
1-5 p.m.
Thomas Cooley Law School
Auburn Hills Campus, Room 145
2630 Featherstone Rd
Auburn Hills, MI 48326
Chicago, IL Nov. 7
1 – 4:30 p.m.
Chicago Public Library
Harold Washington Library Center
Pritzker Auditorium
400 S. State Street
Chicago, IL 60605
Pittsburgh, PA Nov. 13
1 – 4:30 p.m.
Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh
Auditorium/lecture hall
4400 Forbes Avenue
Pittsburgh, PA 15213
Cleveland, OH Nov. 14
1 – 4:30 p.m.
Cleveland Public Library
Louis Stokes Wing Auditorium (Lower Level)
525 Superior Ave.
Cleveland, OH 44114
Minneapolis, MN Nov. 17  
1 – 4:30 p.m.
Minneapolis Central Library
Pohlad Hall
300 Nicollet Mall
Minneapolis, MN 55401
Milwaukee, WI Nov. 19
1 – 4:30 p.m.
Milwaukee Public Library
Meeting Room 1
814 W. Wisconsin Ave.
Milwaukee, WI 53233