Replies to post #17802 on Finjan Holdings Inc (FNJN)

[dndodd]

I hear you but as companies change and grow the shareholder base changes.

ie the two biggest over 10 % holders are gone.
There is one new one in town possibly looking for a board seat.
Institutional ownership is growing.

My only point trying to be realistic and opened minded hear not a pumper, what worked last year may not work the same going forward.

The next few CC’s will be interesting.

[Paullee]

FNJN may have dodged a bullet ?
Fed. Circ. Knocks 'Incorrect' PTAB Decision In Sophos Case
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By Ryan Davis
Law360 (March 28, 2018, 9:18 PM EDT) -- The Federal Circuit on Wednesday vacated a Patent Trial and Appeal Board decision that some claims of a Sophos Ltd. anti-malware patent are invalid as obvious, ruling that the board used an incorrect claim construction that "fundamentally misread the patent."

The appeals court said that the way the PTAB read the claims of Sophos' patent in the inter partes review was "detached from the essential function of the invention" and "legally incorrect."

"Because the board's claim construction, as the board understood its scope, is incorrect, we vacate the board's decision and remand for further proceedings," the court said.

The patent at issue, which describes computer programs used to detect malicious software, was challenged by Sophos' rival Finjan Holdings Inc.

Finjan did not participate in the appeal because it reached a settlement last year resolving all of its patent disputes with Sophos, following a $15 million jury verdict that Sophos infringed eight Finjan patents. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, therefore, intervened to defend the board's decision on appeal.

The patent describes a computer program that monitors a program for indications of malicious behavior. It compares indications of such behavior with a database of malicious behaviors and takes action if there is a match.

The case hinged on a claim in the patent that involves assigning a "rank" to a predetermined collection of malicious behavior to determine the threat level of the observed behavior. The patent refers to malicious behaviors as "genes" and the collections as "phenotypes," and says that the phenotypes are ranked.

The PTAB construed that phrase to mean that the phenotypes stored in the database are ranked based on how similar they are to the set of malicious behaviors observed in the program. The Federal Circuit said that is wrong and gets the process backwards.

The "only reasonable understanding" of the patent is that the phenotypes are ranked using independent information, not by comparing them to the malicious behaviors observed in the program, the danger of which is not yet known, the court said.

"In short, nothing in the claims, the specification, or the prosecution history supports the board's understanding that the predetermined phenotypes are ranked based on their similarity to the observed malicious behavior indications," the court said.

The board's incorrect understanding of the ranking appears to be the central basis for its finding that Sophos' patent is obvious in view of earlier patents, the Federal Circuit said, so the case must be remanded for further proceedings.

An attorney for Sophos could not immediately be reached for comment Wednesday.

The patent-in-suit is U.S. Patent Number 8,776,218.

U.S. Circuit Judges Richard Taranto, Sharon Prost and Kathleen O'Malley sat on the panel for the Federal Circuit.

Sophos is represented by Stanley Panikowski III, Sean Cunningham and Kathryn Grasso of DLA Piper.

The USPTO is represented by Molly Silfen, Nathan Kelley, Sarah Craven, Thomas Krause and William LaMarca of the USPTO's Office of the Solicitor.

The case is Sophos Ltd. v. Iancu, case number 2017-1567, in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.