Skechers IPR Still Kicking After Director Review, PTAB Litigation Blog
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In a Director Review, the Acting Director reversed a panel decision to discretionarily deny an IPR under § 325(d). The Acting Director held that the PTAB’s own findings in two previous IPRs sufficiently proved Examiner error during prosecution. See Skechers U.S.A., Inc. v. Nike, Inc., No. IPR2025-00141, Paper 23 (P.T.A.B. Aug. 21, 2025).
In November 2024, Skechers filed a petition seeking IPR of U.S. Patent No. 8,266,749 (the “’749 Patent”), which claims several methods of manufacturing footwear by simultaneous knitting. In the petition, Skechers argued that U.S. Patent No. 5,345,638 (“Nishida”) anticipated several claims of the ’749 Patent. However, during the ’749 Patent’s prosecution, Nike successfully convinced the Examiner that Nishida did not disclose the claimed simultaneous knitting.
