Background
When a PTAB panel finds a patent claim unpatentable in an inter partes review (IPR) — while a district court jury simultaneously finds that same claim valid and infringed — the resulting conflict raises a fundamental question: which decision controls? The Patent Trial and Appeal Board and district courts operate under different standards and different records, so conflicts can arise. In 2021, the Supreme Court held in United States v. Arthrex that the USPTO Director must have supervisory authority over PTAB decisions to satisfy the Appointments Clause. That ruling created what is now called “Director Review” — the Director’s ability to reconsider and modify PTAB decisions.
Pictiva Displays International holds U.S. Patent No. 11,828,425, which relates to display technology. Samsung Display Co., Ltd. petitioned for IPR, and the PTAB panel’s Final Written Decision (issued January 22, 2026, corrected February 9) found claims 2, 4, 9–12, and 17 of the ‘425 patent unpatentable as obvious. The problem: just weeks earlier, on November 3, 2025, a jury in the Eastern District of Texas found that claim 2 of the same patent was infringed and not invalid. Pictiva promptly notified the Board of the jury verdict on November 18, 2025; Samsung Display responded on November 23. Despite those submissions, the Board’s Final Written Decision did not discuss the jury verdict or the parties’ submissions regarding it.
The Director’s Holding
Director John Squires granted Director Review and vacated the Board’s Final Written Decision as to claims 2 and 17. The core problem, Director Squires found, was that “the Board did not explain why its outcome as to claim 2, which differed from that of the district court’s adjudication, is warranted.”
Director Squires grounded the decision in a September 16, 2025 USPTO Memorandum titled “PTAB Consideration of Prior Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law.” That memorandum requires that when the Board reaches a final decision on a finding that differs from a prior district court finding on the same issue, the Board must explain why a different outcome is warranted — with an even more detailed explanation required if the same or substantially the same evidence and arguments were presented in both proceedings.
The PTAB panel had done neither. It made no mention of the jury’s November verdict on claim 2, and it failed to assess whether Samsung Display’s IPR invalidity arguments were substantially similar to those rejected by the jury. Director Squires extended the vacatur to claim 17 as well, because the panel had analyzed claim 17 together with claim 2 and reached the same conclusion based on the same reasoning.
On remand, the Board must consider the parties’ submissions about the district court proceedings and, if it still concludes that claims 2 and 17 are unpatentable, it must explain why a different outcome is warranted. If the Board finds that Samsung Display’s IPR evidence and arguments were substantially the same as those presented at trial, a more detailed explanation is required. The Board was given 30 days to issue its remand decision.
Key Takeaways
- The September 2025 USPTO Memorandum on parallel proceedings is an enforceable directive, not optional guidance — PTAB panels that ignore a contrary jury verdict risk reversal on Director Review.
- A PTAB panel cannot simply ignore a jury’s validity finding. If the Board’s IPR conclusion differs from a jury’s, it must affirmatively explain why.
- Director Review is functioning as intended post-Arthrex: the Director is actively supervising PTAB decisions for legal and procedural consistency, particularly in cases with parallel district court proceedings.
- Patent owners who obtain favorable jury verdicts should promptly notify the PTAB in any parallel IPR proceedings — and should contest any PTAB FWD that doesn’t address the jury’s findings.
Why It Matters
The proliferation of parallel patent litigation — in district courts and before the PTAB simultaneously — has long created a risk of conflicting outcomes. A patent claim can be found valid and infringed by a jury and, at the same time, unpatentable by a PTAB panel. Courts and the PTAB apply different standards, different procedural rules, and operate on different records, so some divergence is inevitable. But the September 2025 USPTO Memorandum and this Director Review decision signal a new expectation: the PTAB must at least reckon with what a jury decided before reaching a contrary conclusion. Silent divergence — ignoring a jury verdict as if it doesn’t exist — is no longer acceptable.
This decision, together with the Express Mobile v. GoDaddy PTAB Delegated Rehearing Panel decision from May 2026 (which similarly reversed a PTAB invalidity finding that conflicted with a $253 million jury verdict in Delaware), indicates that Director Squires is building a consistent body of Director Review precedent requiring the PTAB to grapple with parallel jury proceedings.
Surfaced via newsletter intake: IPWatchdog (Gene Quinn / Rose Esfandiari, June 25, 2026).