After four-years of reexamination, Amazon's much-maligned 1-click patent is emerging from reexamination largely unscathed. In a recent notice of intent to issue a reexamination certificate, the USPTO confirmed the patentability of original claims 6-10 and amended claims 1-5 and 11-26. The approved-of amendment adds the seeming trivial limitation that the one-click system operates as part of a "shopping cart model." Thus, to infringe the new version of the patent, an eCommerce retailer must use a shopping cart model (presumably non-1-click) alongside of the 1-click version. Because most retail eCommerce sites still use the shopping cart model, the added limitation appears to have no practical impact on the patent scope.
[Updated] The patent application was filed in 1997 and the patent is expected to expire in September, 2017. Amazon still has continuation applications pending that claim priority to the original 1997 filing.
I’m afraid that this case could become the poster-child for post-grant reform.
See:
- Patent No. 5,960,411.
- Reexamination No. 90/007,946.
- File Attachment: 90007946.pdf (250 KB) (Notice of intent to issue reexamination certificate).
- File Attachment: 90007946 (1).pdf (271 KB) (Amendments made by Amazon that were eventually accepted by the PTO).
- Hat tip to TechFlash.com.
