SRAM, LLC v. FOX Factory, Inc.

In Graham v. John Deere Co. of Kansas City, 383 U.S. 1 (1966), this Court recog­ nized the pivotal importance of “objective indicia” of nonobviousness (also known as “secondary considerations”) - including the long-felt but unsolved need for the paV tented invention, the failure of others to arrive at the invention, and the invention’s subsequent commercial success - in determining whether a patent’s claims were ob­ vious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the invention under 35 U.S.C. § 103. In this case, the Federal Circuit effectively undermined this Court’s standard by improperly creating a new categorical and overly restrictive limitation on the consid­ eration of objective indicia of nonobviousness that exists nowhere in the Patent Act or this Court’s jurisprudence. The question presented is: Whether the Federal Circuit erred in holding that, under 35 U.S.C. § 103, before a nexus can be presumed between objective indicia of nonobviousness and the patent claim, a patentee must first prove that a commercial product is “essentially the claimed invention” - to the exclusion of all other product features.