US 8323060

I'll search for authoritative information on this specific patent number.

Let me search specifically for CAFC 2026 activity and recent litigation involving this patent.

Let me search for the actual claim text and any 2026 Federal Circuit activity.

Search note

I searched for the exact identifier 8323060 / US 8,323,060 B2. All substantive hits returned content for that patent specifically (Google Patents, the printed front page reproduced in a PTAB exhibit, PTAB/Docket Alarm records, and the Federal Circuit opinions). I deliberately did not return the near-miss "US 8,323,060" confusions or the unrelated GB 8323060 priority document that surfaced incidentally. The full patent text you supplied was treated as authoritative.

One caveat up front: I found no 2026 CAFC docket activity for US 8,323,060. See the litigation section below.

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1. Bibliographic summary

Note on the assignee discrepancy: the issued front page reads "John Mezzalingua Associates, Inc.," while Google Patents' header lists "PPC Broadband Inc" as both original and current assignee. These are reconcilable — PPC Broadband is the successor by recorded name change — but the original assignee of record was John Mezzalingua Associates.

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2. Abstract (verbatim)

"A coaxial cable connector comprising a connector body; a post engageable with the connector body; a nut, rotatable with respect to the post and the connector body, the nut having a first end and an opposing second end, wherein the nut includes an internal lip; and a continuity member disposed within a second end portion of the nut and contacting the post and the nut, so that the continuity member extends electrical grounding continuity through the post and the nut is provided."

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3. Plain-language overview of the independent claims

Important caveat on claim text: the full patent text you supplied contains the specification and the "Summary of the Invention" aspects, but not a verbatim claims listing. The claim language below is reconstructed from the CAFC opinion PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC, 815 F.3d 747 (Fed. Cir. 2016), the CAFC remand order (2017-1362/1363/1364), and the PTAB Final Written Decision in IPR2013-00342. I have verbatim language for the key limitations but not for every word of every independent claim — treat the paraphrases as reliable in substance, not as certified quotes.

Claim 1 — the core apparatus claim (challenged in IPR2013-00340). A coaxial-cable connector with a connector body, a post (having a post engaging surface and a flange), and a rotatable coupler/nut with an internal lip (having a forward-facing lip surface and a rearward-facing lip surface). The distinguishing element is a continuity member disposed only rearward of the forward-facing lip surface of the coupler's internal lip. That member has (a) a continuity base portion extending between the post and the connector body, and (b) a continuity contact surface configured to be biased against the rearward-facing lip surface of the coupler so as to maintain electrical continuity. In plain terms: a springy conductive insert sits behind the nut's internal lip and is squeezed between the post and the body, keeping the nut electrically tied to the post even when the nut is loose or rotating.

Claim 10 — the second independent claim (challenged in IPR2013-00342, and the claim at the center of the "reside around" appeal). Same general connector, but the continuity member is "positioned to reside around an external portion of the connector body when the connector is assembled," and is said to help facilitate grounding continuity through the body and nut and extend electromagnetic shielding from the cable through the connector to help prevent RF ingress. The Federal Circuit held (Feb. 2016) that "reside around" means "encircle or surround," not the Board's broad "in the immediate vicinity of; near" — a construction that then also governs dependent claims 13, 14, and 22–25, which are directed to the location of the continuity member.

Claim 13 (dependent, but constructionally significant) — adds "axial lengthwise contact" between the continuity member and the post. The PTAB in IPR2013-00342 construed this as requiring contact having at least some length along the axis, i.e., more than a theoretical point, while declining to read in a specific minimum.

The remaining claims are dependents adding structural or functional detail (resiliency of the continuity member, specific contact tabs/flanges, sealing members, retention features).

Method aspect (from the specification's fourth "aspect"): providing such a connector, attaching a cable so the grounding shield contacts the post, extending continuity from post → continuity member → nut, and fastening the nut to a conductive interface port to complete the ground path — notably even when the nut is not fully tightened.

Observation worth flagging: the granted claims use "coupler," "continuity base portion," and "continuity contact surface," whereas the Summary of the Invention in the specification is drafted in terms of a "nut," a "second end portion of the nut," and "a continuity member disposed axially rearward of a surface of the internal lip." The issued claims therefore read differently from the summary paragraphs — consistent with amendments made during prosecution. Do not assume the summary text equals the claim scope.

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4. PTAB and appellate history (factual, well-supported)

• June 10, 2013 — Corning Gilbert Inc. filed IPR2013-00340 (claims 1–9) and IPR2013-00342 (claims 10–25) against the '060 patent. Request for IPR2013-00342 was amended June 26, 2013.
• Nov. 26, 2013 — Board instituted both proceedings.
• Nov. 21, 2014 — Final Written Decisions issued (Paper 79 in -00340, 56 pages; Paper 49 in -00342, 32 pages).
• Jan. 14, 2015 — PPC appealed to the Federal Circuit.
• Feb. 22, 2016 — Federal Circuit remanded. The opinion at 815 F.3d 747 reversed the Board's construction of "reside around."
• April 15, 2016 — Mandate issued.
• Nov. 16, 2016 — Board Decision on Remand (Paper 89). PPC appealed again Dec. 15, 2016.
• July 3, 2018 — Federal Circuit vacated again in the consolidated nonprecedential appeal 2017-1362/1363/1364, citing the same three errors (insufficient factual findings on the Matthews + Tatsuzuki combination; improper treatment of PPC's "SignalTight" commercial-success evidence; failure to weigh unrebutted copying/failure-of-others evidence).
• Aug. 24, 2018 — Mandate.
• Oct. 1, 2018 — Board granted the parties' joint motion and terminated IPR2013-00340 under 35 U.S.C. § 317 after settlement. PPC represented that the '060 patent was not involved in any other litigation or PTO proceeding and that no further proceedings were contemplated.

The parallel Federal Circuit decision on the related '320 and '353 patents is PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC, 815 F.3d 734 (Fed. Cir. 2016) ("PPC I").

District court: a case was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York, Case No. 5:13-cv-00460; a related docket entry appears as Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC v. PPC Broadband, Inc.

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5. Direct answer on "CAFC 2026 dockets"

I found no Federal Circuit docket in 2026, or any 2026 filing at all, involving US 8,323,060. Every appellate proceeding I could locate is from 2015–2018, and the last PTAB proceeding was terminated by settlement in October 2018, with the patent owner representing on the record that no other proceedings were pending or contemplated.

Because I cannot query the Federal Circuit's PACER/CM-ECF dockets directly, I must state this as a limitation rather than a certainty: it is possible a 2026 appeal exists that did not surface in web-accessible sources. If you need a definitive answer, the authoritative check is the CAFC docket (via PACER/CM-ECF) searched by patent number or by party, plus the USPTO Patent Center "Litigation" tab for application 13/523,668.

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6. Explicit uncertainty flags

1. Exact verbatim text of all 25 claims — I have verified text for the key limitations of claims 1, 10, and 13 only. Full claim text should be confirmed against the issued patent or Patent Center.
2. 2026 CAFC activity — no evidence found; absence of evidence here is not proof of absence (see above).
3. Assignee chain — reconciled from Google Patents' reassignment timeline; the front page and Google's "Original Assignee" field conflict on their face, but the discrepancy is explained by the 2013 name-change recordings.
4. PTAB outcome on the merits — the final word is procedural: both proceedings ended in settlement/termination, not with a surviving merits affirmance. Do not describe the '060 claims as "upheld" on the merits; describe the IPR as terminated by settlement after two Federal Circuit remands.

I'll research the litigation history for US Patent 8323060. Let me start with several targeted searches.

Let me dig deeper into the specific cases and their outcomes.

Let me search for the remaining case details and outcomes.

Litigation Involving U.S. Patent No. 8,323,060

Important note on scope and confidence: I was able to confirm litigation from Google Patents' own "litigation" data, the Stanford NPE Litigation Database, Docket Alarm/Unified Patents records, court filings reproduced on Justia/CourtListener, and PTAB filings. I could not complete a full live PACER/RPX/Unified Patents case-list pull before hitting my research limit, so certain outcomes below are flagged as unconfirmed. I have not auto-corrected any patent or case identifiers.

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A. District Court Litigation

1. PPC Broadband, Inc. (f/k/a John Mezzalingua Associates, Inc.) d/b/a PPC v. Corning Gilbert Inc. (later Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC)

• Plaintiff: PPC Broadband, Inc. d/b/a PPC (f/k/a John Mezzalingua Associates, Inc.)
• Defendant: Corning Gilbert Inc. (later Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC)
• Jurisdiction: U.S. District Court, Northern District of New York (Judge Gary L. Sharpe)
• Case No.: 5:12-cv-00911-GLS-DEP
• Filing date: 2012 (case); the '060 patent entered the case via the Second Amended Complaint dated December 4, 2012 (the '060 patent issued that same day). The Second Amended Complaint asserted U.S. Patent Nos. 8,192,237; 8,287,320; 8,313,353; and 8,323,060 ("the '060 patent").
• Outcome / status: Claim construction was litigated (Magistrate Judge David E. Peebles' Report & Recommendation issued Dec. 5, 2013; adopted by Judge Sharpe in 2014). Notably, the court construed "positioned along the post" to require that the continuity member be located behind the internal lip of the nut — reading a prosecution-history disavowal into the term. All claims in this litigation involving the '060 patent were dismissed with prejudice by court order on January 3, 2017, pursuant to a settlement agreement (confirmed in the Sept. 25, 2018 Joint Motion to Terminate in IPR2013-00340).
• Sources: https://insight.rpxcorp.com/litigation_documents/[10025044](/patent/10025044) ; https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2014-00736/.../Exhibit-1078... ; https://cases.justia.com/federal/district-courts/new-york/nyndce/5:2012cv00911/[90113/103](https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/search/patent/reelFrameDetail?reelFrame=90113-0103)/0.pdf ; https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2013-00340/.../Motion-94-Joint_Motion_To_Terminate_Proceeding.pdf

2. PPC Broadband, Inc. d/b/a PPC v. Times Fiber Communications, Inc.

• Plaintiff: PPC Broadband, Inc. d/b/a PPC
• Defendant: Times Fiber Communications, Inc.
• Jurisdiction: U.S. District Court, Northern District of New York (Magistrate Judge Thérèse Wiley Dancks / assigned Judge Thomas J. McAvoy, per "TJM-DEP")
• Case No.: 5:13-cv-00460-TJM-DEP
• Filing date: Complaint dated April 25, 2013
• Asserted patent: The '060 patent was Count IV of the complaint (along with the '229 patent). Accused products: Times Fiber "QC II with QuickShield" series coaxial connectors (e.g., part numbers TFC-QC2TQS-06U-3 and TFC-QC2QS-06U-3).
• Outcome / status: Unconfirmed. A 2014 docket entry (Doc. 34) addressed a protective-order/prosecution-bar dispute, so the case was active at least into 2014. I could not confirm a final disposition.
• Note on identification: This case appears in Google Patents' litigation listing for US 8,323,060 as the "US case filed in New York Northern District Court" — https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/litigation/New%20York%20Northern%20District%20Court/case/5%3A13-cv-00460
• Sources: https://insight.rpxcorp.com/litigation_documents/10025044 ; https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/new-york/nyndce/5:2013cv00460/93947/34/

3. PerfectVision Manufacturing, Inc. v. PPC Broadband, Inc.

• Plaintiff: PerfectVision Manufacturing, Inc.
• Defendant: PPC Broadband, Inc. d/b/a PPC
• Jurisdiction: U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Arkansas, Western Division (Judge J. Leon Holmes, "JLH")
• Case No.: 4:12-cv-00623-JLH
• Filing date: 2012 (listed by Stanford NPE Database as a case involving this patent)
• Nature: Declaratory judgment / invalidity action; PerfectVision served invalidity contentions against numerous PPC patents in this case.
• Outcome / status: Unconfirmed. The Stanford NPE database lists it as a case involving US 8,323,060; I could not confirm final resolution.
• Source: https://npe.law.stanford.edu/patent/8323060

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B. PTAB — Inter Partes Review

4. Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC (Corning Gilbert Inc.) v. PPC Broadband, Inc.

• Case No.: IPR2013-00340
• Patent challenged: U.S. 8,323,060
• Filing date: June 10, 2013
• Claims challenged: 1–9
• Outcome / status: Terminated by settlement. The parties filed a Joint Motion to Terminate Proceeding (Paper 94) on September 25, 2018, under 35 U.S.C. § 317(a), expressly stating termination "will not be deemed a Final Written Decision under 35 U.S.C. § 318." Google Patents lists this as "IPR2013-00340 filed (Settlement)."
• Source: https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2013-00340/.../Motion-94-Joint_Motion_To_Terminate_Proceeding.pdf

5. Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC v. PPC Broadband, Inc.

• Case No.: IPR2013-00342
• Patent challenged: U.S. 8,323,060
• Filing date: June 10, 2013 (institution decision Nov. 26, 2013)
• Claims challenged: 10–25
• Outcome / status: Final Written Decision entered November 21, 2014 (Paper 49) holding claims 10–25 unpatentable under § 103(a) over Matthews in view of Tatsuzuki. PPC appealed. The Federal Circuit vacated and remanded on the construction of "reside around." On remand ("Corning II," Paper 57), the Board reconsidered and held that Corning had NOT shown claims 10–25 unpatentable.
• Sources: https://www.finnegan.com/a/web/[115890](/patent/115890)/2G4qV7/corning-ii-57.pdf ; https://services.patexia.com/lawsuits/Corning-Optical-Communications-RF-LLC-v-PPC-Broadband-Inc-id-62235 ; Google Patents listing "IPR2013-00342 (Final Written Decision)"

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C. Federal Circuit Appeals

6. PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC, 815 F.3d 734 (Fed. Cir. 2016)

• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
• Nature: Consolidated appeal of four Board IPR final decisions involving PPC's '320, '060, and '353 patents.
• Holding bearing on the '060 patent: The court addressed the constructions of "continuity member" / "electrical continuity member," the "maintain electrical continuity" limitations, "shaped/configured to fit," and "reside around." Relevant to the '060 patent, the court vacated the Board's unpatentability determinations as to the "maintain electrical continuity" claims (including claims 1–9 of the '060) and vacated the "reside around" construction, remanding for further proceedings; other findings were affirmed.
• Sources: https://case-law.vlex.com/vid/ppc-broadband-inc-v-890178310 ; https://app.midpage.ai/case/ppc-broadband-inc-v-corning-[3179244](/patent/3179244)

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D. Related/Owner Context (not '060-specific — flagged to avoid confusion)

The following involve PPC Broadband but concern different patents and should not be attributed to the '060 patent:

• PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC, No. 2017-1347 (Fed. Cir. Mar. 13, 2018) — Rule 36 affirmance on appeal from N.D.N.Y. No. 5:11-cv-00761-GLS-DEP (the '194 and '940 patents; $23.85M royalty verdict).
• PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Amphenol Corp., Nos. 2024-1776/-1777/-1778/-1779 (Fed. Cir. Mar. 4, 2026) — Rule 36 affirmance of PTAB IPR2022-00718/-00719/-00720/-00721 (four coaxial-cable patents; not the '060 patent).
• PPC Broadband, Inc. v. PCT International, Inc., N.D.N.Y. No. 5:13-cv-0135-GTS-DEP; and PPC Broadband v. Corning Gilbert, N.D.N.Y. No. 5:13-cv-00538-GLS-DEP — additional related connector litigation by the same owner.

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Summary Table (US 8,323,060)

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Caveats and Recommended Verification

1. Google Patents' own litigation data for US 8,323,060 lists exactly: (a) PTAB IPR2013-00340 (Settlement); (b) PTAB IPR2013-00342 (Final Written Decision); and (c) a US civil action in the Northern District of New York, Case No. 5:13-cv-00460 — all consistent with the above.
2. Darts-IP reports "first worldwide family litigation filed" for this patent family (link: https://patents.darts-ip.com/?family=43124856), indicating possible foreign/parallel proceedings in the family that I could not itemize.
3. I could not verify final dispositions for the Times Fiber (5:13-cv-00460) and PerfectVision (4:12-cv-00623) matters within my research constraints; these should be confirmed via PACER and the Unified Patents litigation portal (https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/litigation/caselist).
4. Case outcomes reflecting the owner's extensive connector-portfolio litigation (Corning, PCT International, Amphenol, Times Fiber) are frequently interrelated and settled confidentially; several settlements are under seal.

I'll start by pulling the public record on the two PTAB case numbers surfaced in the patent's own prosecution/litigation metadata, plus any other AIA trials on this patent.

Strong initial hits. Now let me nail down the claim-level outcomes, appeal dockets, and whether any additional AIA trials exist on this patent.

The record shows two Corning IPRs plus a possible 2022 Amphenol action. Let me verify the Amphenol matter and scan for any other AIA trials on this patent.

AIA Trial Proceedings on U.S. Patent No. 8,323,060 ("Coaxial cable connector having electrical continuity member")

Data-source note (read first): The structured "PTAB proceedings on file" block you supplied says the USPTO ODP API returns no AIA trial proceedings for this patent. That block is stale/incomplete. The patent's own Google Patents prosecution-and-litigation metadata — which is part of the authoritative record you provided — lists two PTAB cases for this exact patent, and both were verified against PTAB papers, Federal Circuit opinions, and the PTACTS docket:

"PTAB case IPR2013-00340 filed (Settlement)" and "PTAB case IPR2013-00342 filed (Final Written Decision)"

Both are real, both were directed at the '060 patent, and both are Corning v. PPC proceedings. No PGR, no CBM, and no later (post‑2013) AIA petition against the '060 was identified. The 2022–2024 Amphenol matters (IPR2022‑00718/‑00719/‑00720/‑00721) are not proceedings on the '060 — they target U.S. 10,965,063; 10,446,983; 10,038,284; and 9,225,083 (same family/owner, different patents). They are discussed below only as a pattern signal.

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Proceedings overview

Two AIA trials have been filed on US 8,323,060 — both inter partes reviews by Corning, both filed in June 2013, together covering all 25 claims of the patent (IPR2013‑00340 → claims 1–9; IPR2013‑00342 → claims 10–25); the bottom line is that zero claims of the '060 have been canceled by a surviving Final Written Decision — one proceeding produced Board unpatentability findings twice, both times vacated on appeal, and then settled (claims 1–9), while the other ended in a merits decision holding claims 10–25 not unpatentable on remand from the Federal Circuit — so a defendant should treat this patent as adjudicated-and-hardened as to claims 10–25, and unresolved-but-twice-held-obvious-as-to claims 1–9, which is a materially weaker position for the patent owner than "the patent crushed two IPRs."

In other words: if a demand letter cites claims 10–25, the PTAB has already said Corning's Matthews + Tatsuzuki theory fails and the claims stand; if it cites claims 1–9, the Board found those claims obvious over the same art twice, but both decisions were vacated (procedurally/on the objective-indicia record), and the proceeding was killed by a confidential settlement before any final adjudication — meaning the art is real, but nobody has a clean, citable win.

The two proceedings are presented below in order of practical impact on a defendant being asserted against today (claims 1–9 first, because those are the claims a plaintiff/assertion letter of a connector patent is most likely to lead with).

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IPR2013-00340 — Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC (f/k/a Corning Gilbert Inc.) v. PPC Broadband, Inc.

• Type: Inter Partes Review (35 U.S.C. §§ 311–319)
• Filed: June 2013 — the petition and supporting Mroczkowski declaration are dated 2013‑06‑10, filed under 35 U.S.C. § 311 and 37 C.F.R. § 42.102 within one year of service of PPC's amended complaint in PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Corning Gilbert Inc., No. 5:12‑cv‑00911‑GLS‑DEP (N.D.N.Y.); an amended petition was filed as Paper 5. (Docket: https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2013-00340/Inter_Partes_Review_of_U.S._Pat._8323060/)
• Status: Structured data: "filed (Settlement)." Plain English: terminated by joint motion under 35 U.S.C. § 317(a) after a confidential settlement — no FWD stands; the proceeding is a nullity on the merits.
• Judge panel: Jameson Lee, Josiah C. Cocks, and Michael R. Zecher, Administrative Patent Judges (Zecher authored the institution decision; the same panel handled the 2018 SAS order).
• Petition grounds: Inter partes review of claims 1–9 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a), on three alternative theories: (1) claims 1–6, 8, 9 over Japanese Published Application JP 2002‑015823 ("Tatsuzuki") in view of U.S. Patent No. 6,558,194 ("Montena") and U.S. Pub. No. 2006/0110977 ("Matthews"); (2) claim 7 with the addition of U.S. Patent No. 4,106,835 ("Halbeck"); and (3) claims 1–9 over Matthews in view of Tatsuzuki. No § 102 or § 112 grounds were presented.
• Institution decision: 2013‑11‑26 — instituted as to claims 1–9, but only on the Matthews + Tatsuzuki § 103(a) ground. The other grounds (the Tatsuzuki + Montena + Matthews theories) were non-instituted (Paper 18; https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2013-00340/Inter_Partes_Review_of_U.S._Pat._8323060/docs/11-26-2013-Board/Institution_Decision-18-Decision___Institution_of_Inter_Partes_Review.pdf). Panel reasoning: the petition established a reasonable likelihood that claims 1–9 were unpatentable over Matthews + Tatsuzuki.
• Final Written Decision: 2014‑11‑21 — FWD under § 318(a) holding claims 1–9 unpatentable as obvious over Matthews + Tatsuzuki. This FWD was vacated and does not stand. PPC appealed.
  • Appeal #1: Nos. 2015‑1361, ‑1366, ‑1368, ‑1369 (consolidated with the '320 and '353 IPRs), decided 2016‑02‑22, PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Corning Optical Commc'ns RF, LLC, 815 F.3d 734 (Fed. Cir. 2016) (Moore, O'Malley, Wallach). The court vacated the Board's determination that claims 1–9 of the '060 patent are unpatentable and remanded. Holding/quote: the Board's construction of "continuity member"/"electrical continuity member" (requiring only contact, not continuous contact) was "not unreasonable" under the broadest reasonable interpretation, and the court noted that "[u]nder Phillips, we would hold that the correct construction of the term 'continuity member' requires, as PPC Broadband argues, a continuous or consistent connection." Because claims 1–9 also contain an express requirement that the continuity member "maintain electrical continuity" — e.g., "maintain electrical continuity between the coupler and the post when the coupler is in the partially tightened position … even when the coupler is in the fully tightened position … and even when the post moves relative to the coupler" — the Board's failure to make any factual findings on temporal continuity required vacatur. The court also reversed the Board on the commercial-success presumption (PPC's SignalTight connectors were undisputed commercial embodiments). https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/[3179262](/patent/3179262)/ppc-broadband-inc-v-corning-optical-communications-rf-llc/
  • Remand: Board order on remand 2016‑08‑04 (Paper 85) declining to entertain PPC's new real-party-in-interest attack under § 312(a)(2); PPC's RPI argument arose from 2015‑08‑18 PTAB decisions in related Corning IPRs finding Corning had failed to name two RPIs that funded and/or controlled those challenges. Paper 85 at 4: "Further proceeding in this case is closed to any issue that was not raised by any party for a decision in the 2014 FWD."
  • Appeal #2: Nos. 2017‑1362, ‑1363, ‑1364 (from IPR2013‑00340, ‑00345, ‑00346), decided 2018‑07‑03 (nonprecedential). The court vacated again: "The Board repeated these same errors on remand. We therefore vacate the Board's determination that claims 8, 16, and 31 of the '320 patent, claims 1‑9 of the '060 patent, and claims 7‑27 of the '353 patent are unpatentable, and remand once more for further proceedings." The court also declined to vacate solely for partial-grounds (SAS) institution error. https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2013-00340/Corning_Optical_Communications_RF_LLC_v._PPC_Broadband_Inc/docs/09-17-2018-Board/Other_Not_for_motions-91-Remand.pdf
• Settlement / termination: On 2018‑09‑17 the Board issued an order (Paper 93) re-instituting under SAS Inst., Inc. v. Iancu, 138 S. Ct. 1348 (2018) — which meant the previously non-instituted grounds (Tatsuzuki + Montena + Matthews, etc.) would have to be tried — and authorizing joint motions to terminate. On 2018‑09‑25 the parties filed a Joint Motion to Terminate under § 317(a), citing a confidential written settlement agreement (Ex. 2093) resolving the '060 and other patents, with the express proviso that termination "will not be deemed a Final Written Decision under 35 U.S.C. § 318(a)." The motion states the N.D.N.Y. case was dismissed with prejudice as to the '060 by order dated 2017‑01‑03, and that the '060 was in no other litigation or USPTO proceeding. https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2013-00340/Inter_Partes_Review_of_U.S._Pat._8323060/docs/09-25-2018-Patent-Owner/Motion-94-Joint_Motion_To_Terminate_Proceeding.pdf (termination order entered after the joint motion; the Board's authorizing order is at https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2013-00340/Inter_Partes_Review_of_U.S._Pat._8323060/docs/09-17-2018-Board/Order-93-Reinstitution_under_SAS_and_Authorizing_Joint_Motions_to_Terminate.pdf).
• Appeal: Yes — two Federal Circuit appeals (2015‑1361 et al.; 2017‑1362/‑1363/‑1364), both resulting in vacatur and remand of the '060 claims 1–9 unpatentability determination. Disposition: no affirmance of any '060 claim cancellation.
• Defensive value: Claims 1–9 are alive — you cannot cite a final decision canceling them, so a demand letter resting on claim 1 is not sanction-bait. But the Board found those very claims unpatentable over Matthews + Tatsuzuki twice; the reversals were about missing factual findings on the "maintain electrical continuity" limitation and an erroneously rejected commercial-success presumption, not about the art's substance. For a new defendant, that is a template petition with a clear roadmap — and no § 315(e) estoppel precludes a fresh petitioner (see estoppel discussion below).

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IPR2013-00342 — Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC v. PPC Broadband, Inc.

• Type: Inter Partes Review
• Filed: June 2013, filed concurrently with IPR2013‑00340 and the other Corning petitions (supporting Mroczkowski declaration dated 2013‑06‑10). Docket: https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2013-00340/ (companion) and Patexia/PACER‑mirror docket for Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC v. PPC Broadband, Inc. (N.D.N.Y. 5:12‑cv‑00911).
• Status: Structured data: "filed (Final Written Decision)." Plain English: fully adjudicated; after Federal Circuit vacatur and remand, the Board rejected Corning's invalidity case, and the claims stand.
• Judge panel: Jameson Lee and Josiah C. Cocks and Jackie Wright Bonilla appeared on the consolidated oral hearing record for this session (2014‑07‑25); the 2016‑10‑12 decision on remand is publicly reported as authored by APJ Michael R. Zecher.
• Petition grounds: Inter partes review of claims 10–25 (the sole independent claim at issue on appeal being claim 10) under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a), as obvious over the combination of U.S. Pub. No. 2006/0110977 (Matthews) and JP 2002‑015823 (Tatsuzuki).
• Institution decision: Instituted in the November–December 2013 window (the Federal Circuit records that "[b]etween November and December 2013, the Board instituted four separate IPR proceedings" in the companion matters; the -00342 institution falls in that same period). The Board found a reasonable likelihood that claims 10–25 were unpatentable.
• Final Written Decision: 2014‑11‑21 (Paper 49) — held all of claims 10–25 unpatentable as obvious over Matthews + Tatsuzuki. Key construction: the Board construed "reside around" to mean "in the immediate vicinity of; near" (selecting the fourth, broadest definition from The American Heritage College Dictionary) rather than "encircle or surround."
  • Appeal: No. 2015‑1364, PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Corning Optical Commc'ns RF, LLC, 815 F.3d 747 (Fed. Cir. 2016) (Moore, O'Malley, Wallach, opinion by Moore), decided 2016‑02‑22. Vacated and remanded. The court held the Board "arrived at its construction by referencing the dictionaries cited by the parties and simply selecting the broadest definition therein," that "the broadest reasonable interpretation must be reasonable in light of the claims and specification," and that "in this context the Board's construction is not reasonable." BRI of "reside around" = "encircle or surround." https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/[3179261](/patent/3179261)/ppc-broadband-inc-v-corning-optical-communications-rf-llc/
• Decision on remand / final outcome: 2016‑10‑12 (IPR2013‑00342, Paper 57, Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC v. PPC Broadband, Inc.) — applying the Federal Circuit's construction, the Board held that the prior art in Corning's petition did not render claims 10–25 unpatentable. The Board also denied both parties' requests for further briefing (Paper 55) and refused to let PPC newly raise a § 312(a)(2) real-party-in-interest challenge on remand, reasoning that "[g]iven that the 2014 [FWD] was vacated only because of an error in claim construction, we need, on remand, to correct the error as determined by our reviewing Court. Nothing more is required." Secondary sources: https://www.ptabwatch.com/2016/11/ptab-upholds-claims-under-narrowed-bri-construction-on-remand/ and https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/ptab-reverses-obviousness-finding-after-18801/
• Settlement / termination: None in this proceeding — it ran to a merits decision. (The parties' broader 2016–2017 global settlement ended the N.D.N.Y. case, with claims involving the '060 dismissed with prejudice by order dated 2017‑01‑03.)
• Appeal from the remand decision: No further Federal Circuit appeal by either party was identified in the public record reviewed; the 2016‑10‑12 decision appears to have become final.
• Defensive value: Claims 10–25 are the hard ones. They have been tested on the merits by a sophisticated petitioner with expert testimony and were sustained. Any infringement theory built on claim 10 (or its dependents) cannot be attacked with the argument that "the PTAB already invalidated these." If your invalidity case rests on Matthews + Tatsuzuki alone, expect the Board to follow the 2016‑10‑12 disposition.

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Strategic summary

Claim-by-claim status of US 8,323,060. The patent has 25 claims. Claims 10–25: SUSTAINED — adjudicated patentable on remand (IPR2013‑00342, Paper 57, 2016‑10‑12) after the Federal Circuit narrowed "reside around" to "encircle or surround." Claims 1–9: UNRESOLVED / UNTESTED in any surviving decision — the Board found them unpatentable on 2014‑11‑21 and again on remand, but both determinations were vacated (815 F.3d 734 (Fed. Cir. 2016); nonprecedential vacatur, 2018‑07‑03), and the proceeding was terminated by settlement on § 317(a) grounds in late 2018 with the parties expressly agreeing termination would not count as an FWD. No claim of the '060 has been canceled. The patent's anticipated expiration is 2029‑12‑08, so it is still in force and remains IPR-eligible. (Note the asymmetry with sibling patents: claims 1–7, 9–15, 17–30, and 32 of U.S. 8,287,320 were affirmed unpatentable by the Federal Circuit in 2016 and are canceled — if PPC's portfolio theory leans on the '320, that is a different and much weaker story for PPC.)

Estoppel landscape (§ 315(e)(2)). Because IPR2013‑00340 ended in a § 317(a) settlement with no FWD, and because the 2014 and post-remand FWDs were vacated, no petitioner-side estoppel attaches from that proceeding as to claims 1–9. For claims 10–25, the 2016‑10‑12 decision on remand is the operative § 318(a) final written decision, which means Corning and its privies are estopped from asserting, in district court or the ITC, any ground they raised or reasonably could have raised in IPR2013‑00342. Two practical consequences: (1) a new, unrelated defendant is not estopped at all — the full prior-art universe (including art never presented to the Board) remains available, subject only to § 315(b) timing, § 325(d)/General Plastic discretion, and the Phillips standard now applied in IPRs since 2018‑11‑13; and (2) if you are a Corning customer, indemnitee, or co-defendant in the 2012–2016 actions, privity risk is live — the PTAB found on 2015‑08‑18 in related Corning IPRs that Corning had failed to name two entities as real parties-in-interest because they funded and/or controlled the challenges. Run that privity analysis before telling a client it is free to file.

Pattern signals. Same petitioner, same expert (Dr. Robert S. Mroczkowski), same art across a six-petition wave: Corning Gilbert (later Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC) filed IPR2013‑00340 and ‑00342 on the '060, plus ‑00343/‑00345 on the '353 and ‑00346/‑00347 on the '320. PPC defended aggressively, appealing every adverse FWD (2015‑1361 et al.; 2015‑1364; 2017‑1362/‑1363/‑1364) and picking up favorable precedent (PPC Broadband v. Corning, 815 F.3d 747, on BRI reasonableness and dictionary-based construction; 815 F.3d 734, on objective indicia in IPR — including the holding that the commercial-success presumption applies in IPRs where the petitioner can rebut it). No defensive aggregator (Unified Patents, RPX, etc.) appears anywhere in the '060 chain — the challenges were competitor-driven, not aggregator-driven. The later Amphenol wave (IPR2022‑00718/‑00719/‑00720/‑00721) is the counter-signal: the Board found all challenged claims of four different PPC coaxial patents (9,225,083; 10,038,284; 10,446,983; 10,965,063) unpatentable in October 2023–April 2024 (e.g., '083 FWD, 2024‑04‑29), and the Federal Circuit affirmed on 2026‑03‑04 (Nos. 2024‑1776/‑1777/‑1778/‑1779, Rule 36 judgment, cited at https://www.cafc.uscourts.gov/opinions-orders/24-1776.RULE_36_JUDGMENT.3-4-2026_2656063.pdf). Those patents are not the '060, and the Amphenol art (Youtsey/Tarrant/Bell conductive o-rings) is different art that § 325(d) and § 315(e) do not import into the '060 — but it establishes that PPC's later continuity-member family is being systematically invalidated by a well-funded competitor.

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Recommended next steps

1. Identify which claims you are accused of infringing before doing anything else. If the assertion is on claims 10–25, there is a live adverse adjudication: IPR2013‑00342, Paper 57 (2016‑10‑12), holding that Matthews + Tatsuzuki do not render those claims unpatentable, and the underlying appeal is PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Corning Optical Commc'ns RF, LLC, 815 F.3d 747 (Fed. Cir. 2016) (https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/3179261/ppc-broadband-inc-v-corning-optical-communications-rf-llc/). Do not build a petition on that reference combination. If the assertion is on claims 1–9, you are attacking claims nobody has a surviving win against — but also claims that the Board held unpatentable twice on the exact record you can now copy.

2. If you file an IPR on claims 1–9, page-proof the record the two vacaturs identified as missing. The Federal Circuit's two reversals in this family were not about the reference teachings; they were about (a) no factual findings on the "maintain electrical continuity … when the coupler is in the partially tightened position … even when … fully tightened … and even when the post moves relative to the coupler" limitation (see the '060 claim 1 language quoted at 815 F.3d 734 and in the 2018‑07‑03 nonprecedential decision), and (b) failure to weigh PPC's objective-indicia record (copying by Corning's UltraShield line, failure of others, long-felt need, commercial-success presumption). A petition that affirmatively maps Tatsuzuki/Matthews to temporal continuity across all three operating conditions — and that frontally rebuts the SignalTight commercial-success and copying evidence — is the version of this case the Board has never had the chance to decide.

3. Weight the Phillips risk before you file. Since 2018‑11‑13 the Board applies Phillips in IPRs. The Federal Circuit has already stated, in this very family, that "[u]nder Phillips, we would hold that the correct construction of the term 'continuity member' requires … a continuous or consistent connection" — i.e., a narrower claim than the Board used. Expect PPC to argue for that construction in any new IPR; it will shrink the prior-art coverage on every claim of the '060. Consider pairing an IPR with district-court invalidity contentions on § 112 grounds (the claim set leans heavily on "configured to fit"/"shaped to fit," which the Board construed as "sized and dimensioned to abut one another" — a term ripe for an indefiniteness challenge that the PTAB cannot hear).

4. Plead around § 315(b) and § 325(d) now. The § 315(b) one-year clock runs from service of the complaint. On § 325(d), expect PPC to argue that "the same or substantially the same prior art or arguments previously were presented to the Office" — the counter is that IPR2013‑00342's adverse posture was superseded on remand and IPR2013‑00340 terminated in settlement without a decision, so no ground has actually been adjudicated against PPC on claims 1–9. Build that record in the petition rather than in reply.

5. Verify current status yourself in PTAB E2E / PTACTS before relying on this memo. The ODP structured feed is demonstrably incomplete for this patent (it shows no proceedings; the record shows two). Confirm no new petition has been filed in the interim at the PTAB E2E portal (https://ptacts.uspto.gov/ptabweb/) and via the PTACTS petition search (https://ptacts.uspto.gov/ptacts/public-informations/petitions/[1549312](/patent/1549312) and /1549313 for the -00340 papers). If you find a newly filed petition, the milestone math is simple: institution decision is due within 6 months of the petition's filing, and the FWD within 12 months of institution (35 U.S.C. § 316(a)(11)), extendable for good cause.

Bottom line for a defendant today: the '060 is not a paper tiger — it survived a full merits challenge to claims 10–25 and no claim has ever been canceled. But claims 1–9 were held obvious over Matthews + Tatsuzuki twice, by a panel that was reversed on analysis rather than on the art, and the assertion history (N.D.N.Y. 5:12‑cv‑00911; 5:13‑cv‑00460) plus the 2016–2018 settlement means the patent owner has real money behind it and has already demonstrated willingness to litigate to the Federal Circuit. Treat claims 10–25 as hardened and claims 1–9 as an open flank.

I'll research the assignment record for US 8323060 across the specified sources.

Let me dig into the USPTO assignment records and the corporate chain specifics.

Let me try to pin down the specific reel/frame records and correspondent of record.

Assignment & Ownership Analysis — US Patent 8,323,060 B2

Patent: US 8,323,060 B2 — Coaxial cable connector having electrical continuity member
App. No.: 13/523,668 (continuation of 12/633,792, filed 2009-12-08; provisional 61/180,835, filed 2009-05-22)
Filed: 2012-06-14 · Granted: 2012-12-04 · Anticipated expiration: 2029-12-08

Sourcing caveat up front: I was able to reach the Google Patents legal-events ledger, the Stanford NPE Litigation Database entry for this patent, SEC/Belden filings, and litigation filings from the PTAB record. I was not able to retrieve the underlying USPTO Assignment Center reel/frame numbers or the named correspondent of record for the two post-issuance recordings, and I will not invent them. Where the format below calls for reel/frame or correspondent, I state the gap explicitly. The existence, dates, parties and conveyance types of the recordings are sourced from the Google Patents legal-events mirror of the USPTO assignment record.

Inventors

Pattern notes. The inventors appear to be in-house connector engineers of the Mezzalingua/PPC organization, consistent with the PTAB record in the sibling IPRs, where PPC produced internal John Mezzalingua Associates engineering drawings (address of record: 6176 East Molloy Road, P.O. Box 278, East Syracuse, NY 13057) as exhibits (e.g., PPC Ex. 2084, IPR2013-00345; drawing no. 12524-01, "Continuity Member, 3 Plus"). That is documentary evidence of inventorship while employed by the applicant.

I found no evidence of the "all inventors depart within 12 months of filing" pattern. That signal is unclear / not established — I cannot confirm or refute departure dates from the sources reachable here. Note the family was filed 2009 and continued through 2012–2013, i.e. the inventors were still generating continuations well after the original 2009 filing, which is inconsistent with a mass exodus.

Original assignee

PPC Broadband, Inc. is the assignee named on the face of the issued patent (Google Patents shows "Original Assignee: PPC Broadband Inc" and "Current Assignee: PPC Broadband Inc").

• Predecessor name / applicant of record: John Mezzalingua Associates, Inc. d/b/a PPC.
• Primary business: design and manufacture of coaxial cable connectors, splitters, amplifiers, traps and related broadband connectivity hardware — a genuine, high-volume manufacturer. It is a "Product company" per the Stanford NPE Litigation Database's asserter categorization.
• Product embodying the claims: Yes. PPC/Mezzalingua marketed F-connectors with the claimed continuity-member architecture (the "3 Plus" continuity member drawing above), and this patent family was enforced alongside its commercial connector line in ITC Inv. No. 337-TA-650 and the district-court campaigns listed below. Revenue ~$238M (2012); 774 employees; founded 1940 by John Mezzalingua.
• Current status: Operating, as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Belden Inc. (NYSE: BDC). Belden acquired PPC Broadband, Inc. (a Delaware corporation) and SKT International Holdings B.V. for $515.7 million on 2012-12-10, per Belden's Form 8-K (event date 2012-12-10; filed 2012-12-12; amended 8-K/A filed 2013-02-25). Because this was a stock purchase from the Mezzalingua family trusts (Daniel N. Mezzalingua and family; JM Representatives, LLC as seller representative), no patent assignment was required or recorded — PPC Broadband, Inc. simply continued as the record owner and became a Belden subsidiary. The PPC brand and Syracuse operation continue under Belden's Broadband Solutions platform.

Assignment timeline

Two post-issuance recordings appear in the record, both conveyance type "Change of Name." No assignment, security agreement, license, merger or release has been recorded against this patent.

• 2013-02-12 (recorded) — Reel not retrieved (recorded as a "reassignment" event in the Google Patents legal-events ledger)

  • Conveyance: Change of Name
  • Assignor: John Mezzalingua Associates, Inc.
  • Assignee: MR ADVISERS LIMITED
  • Correspondent: Not retrieved. I could not access the Assignment Center cover-sheet correspondent field for this recording, and I will not guess.
  • Context: Internal reorganization — a corporate name change of the same legal entity (NY corporate records show the "MR Advisers Limited" name in the Mezzalingua name history around Sept 2012), not a transfer to a third party.

• 2013-02-13 (recorded) — Reel not retrieved (recorded as a "reassignment" event in the Google Patents legal-events ledger)

  • Conveyance: Change of Name
  • Assignor: MR ADVISERS LIMITED
  • Assignee: PPC BROADBAND, INC.
  • Correspondent: Not retrieved — same gap as above.
  • Context: Second leg of the same internal name-change sequence, completing the identification of the record owner as PPC Broadband, Inc. (NY corporate name change to "Ppc Broadband, Inc." recorded 2012-12-07; the USPTO recordings lag the corporate actions by ~2 months).

Why there is no Belden assignment entry: the 2012-12-10 Belden transaction was an acquisition of the stock of PPC Broadband, Inc. and SKT, not of patent assets. Ownership of this patent therefore never changed hands at the USPTO; it is still held by PPC Broadband, Inc., now a Belden subsidiary. Anyone reading only the assignment ledger would see a clean Mezzalingua → PPC Broadband name-change chain and no acquirer — the Belden control relationship is only visible in the SEC filing.

Enforcement events (not assignments, listed for context):

• N.D.N.Y. Civil Action 5:13-cv-00460 (PPC Broadband, Inc. d/b/a PPC v. Times Fiber Communications, Inc.).
• PTAB IPR2013-00340 (Corning Gilbert Inc. v. PPC Broadband, Inc.) — terminated by settlement.
• PTAB IPR2013-00342 (Corning Gilbert Inc. v. PPC Broadband, Inc.) — final written decision on this patent.
• Related family enforcement: N.D.N.Y. 5:12-cv-00911 and 5:13-cv-00538 (Corning Gilbert), ITC Inv. No. 337-TA-938, W.D. Wis. 3:11-cv-00424 (Belden), and Stanford's database listing PerfectVision Manufacturing Inc. v. PPC Broadband Inc., 4:12-cv-00623 (E.D. Ark.).

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 8323060
    2009 : Provisional filed by John Mezzalingua
         : Utility application filed Dec 2009
    2012 : Continuation filed Jun 2012
         : Patent issued Dec 2012
         : Belden buys PPC stock for 515.7M
    2013 : Name change recorded to MR Advisers
         : Name change recorded to PPC Broadband
         : Corning Gilbert files IPRs
    2029 : Anticipated expiration

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — not present. No operating-to-licensing-LLC assignment exists on the record. The only two recordings are Change of Name conveyances (2013-02-12 and 2013-02-13), i.e. the same legal entity re-registering under successive corporate names. MR ADVISERS LIMITED superficially reads like an anonymous vehicle, but the conveyance type is a name change, not an assignment, and NY corporate records tie the name to the Mezzalingua corporate name history. No "IP / Patents / Licensing / Holdings / Ventures" assignee, no single-purpose LLC, no registered-agent service address appears as an owner.

2. Known asserter in the chain — not present. Current and original assignee is PPC Broadband, Inc., a Belden Inc. (NYSE: BDC) subsidiary. No match against Acacia, Marathon, Intellectual Ventures, IPNav, Wi-LAN, Conversant/Mosaid, Vringo, Pendrell, Innovatio, MPHJ, Lumen View, Round Rock, Document Generation Corp, or Spangenberg entities. To the contrary, Stanford's NPE database categorizes PPC as a Product company asserter, and PPC/Mezzalingua is itself the target of IPRs (IPR2013-00340/-00342 and siblings) and of a competitor suit (PerfectVision Manufacturing Inc. v. PPC Broadband Inc., 4:12-cv-00623).

3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — unclear. I could not retrieve the correspondent of record for either 2013-02-12 or 2013-02-13 because the Assignment Center cover-sheet fields were not reachable in this session. With only two recordings, both name changes, and no recoverable correspondent, I cannot establish or rule out recurrence. No finding either way.

4. Cascading transfers — not present. The two recordings are one day apart (2013-02-12 → 2013-02-13) but are consecutive legs of a single name change, not transfers among distinct owners. There is no multi-LLC chain, no shared correspondent address to compare, no common-principal pattern.

5. Pre-litigation transfer — not present. The recordings post-date the litigation. Mezzalingua was already suing (e.g. 5:12-cv-00911, 2012; PCT International, 2009) before the February 2013 name-change recordings, so the chain was not arranged to manufacture standing or venue. Ownership never moved away from the enforcer.

6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — not present. The Mezzalingua principals sold PPC Broadband and SKT to Belden for $515.7M cash-plus-facility in a negotiated stock purchase with a $54.5M escrow and five-year noncompetition agreements for Daniel N. Mezzalingua and John Mezzalingua. This is a premium, solvent, going-concern sale to a public strategic buyer — the opposite of a Chapter 7/11 asset sale.

7. Privateering — not present. There is no transfer to a third-party NPE asserting on the operating company's behalf. Belden/PPC asserts its own patents in its own name against direct connector competitors (Corning/Gilbert, Times Fiber, Belden ICMC, PCT International, PerfectVision). This is first-party, non-privateered enforcement.

8. Defensive aggregator (anti-NPE) — not present. The chain does not terminate at RPX, AST, LOT Network, Unified Patents or OIN. (Unified Patents' portal merely indexes this patent as a PPC-owned asset; indexing is not ownership.)

Verdict

Operating-company assertion.

The complete recorded chain for US 8,323,060 is: John Mezzalingua Associates, Inc. d/b/a PPC → (Change of Name) → MR ADVISERS LIMITED → (Change of Name) → PPC BROADBAND, INC., recorded 2013-02-12 and 2013-02-13. There is no assignment to any licensing entity, and the current owner is the original operating manufacturer, which became a wholly-owned subsidiary of Belden Inc. on 2012-12-10 in a $515.7M stock purchase (Belden Form 8-K, event date 2012-12-10). PPC Broadband ships connectors embodying the claims and has sued actual competitors (Corning Gilbert, Times Fiber, PCT International) in its own name — the textbook definition of operating-company assertion, not NPE activity.

Verification links:

• USPTO Assignment Center: https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ (search patent 8323060)
• USPTO assignment search index: https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html
• Google Patents legal events: https://patents.google.com/patent/US8323060/en
• Stanford NPE Litigation Database: https://npe.law.stanford.edu/patent/8323060
• Belden Form 8-K (2012-12-10 acquisition): https://capedge.com/filing/[913142](/patent/913142)/0001193125-12-[500057](/patent/500057)/BDC-8K

Open items to close if you have Assignment Center access: (a) the reel/frame numbers and correspondent name/firm on the 2013-02-12 and 2013-02-13 recordings; (b) whether any later recordings exist that the Google Patents mirror may have dropped (e.g. intra-Belden collateral or intercompany transfers). Based on everything reachable here, neither would change the verdict.

I'll research the prior-art citations on the front page of US 8,323,060 and verify each against authoritative sources.

Let me pull the actual front-page citation list from authoritative copies of this patent.

Let me pull the citation lists from both the USPTO-filed documents and third-party databases.

Scope, method, and one hard caveat before the citations

What I could and could not search. I was able to reach USPTO-hosted documents — the PTAB's own filings and decisions on IPR2013‑00340/‑00342 (ptacts.uspto.gov, and the Paper 49/79 decisions mirrored at finnegan.com) — plus mirrored copies of the printed front page of the patent itself and family members. I was not able to query the USPTO Patent Center / Patent Full‑Text (PatFT) "References Cited" field directly through a structured database query, because my tooling is a web search interface rather than a database client. That is a real limitation and it affects one part of your question (below).

The front-page "References Cited" list is not in the text you supplied. The authoritative full text you provided begins at Abstract → Classifications → Definitions → Description. It contains no (56) References Cited block. Everything I say about the examiner's citation list is therefore sourced externally, and I mark confidence accordingly.

A second caveat that matters for your question. The examiner's citation list on the '060 patent is, as a practical matter, the same boilerplate list carried across the entire Purdy / John Mezzalingua Associates family — US 8,287,320; 8,313,353; 8,323,060; 8,506,326; 9,153,917; 9,496,661 all open with the identical 19th‑century sequence (331,169 Thomas 11/1885; 1,371,742 Dringman 3/1921; 1,667,485 MacDonald 4/1928; 1,766,869 Austin 6/1930; 1,801,999 Bowman 4/1931; 1,885,761 Peirce, Jr. 11/1932; 2,102,495 England 12/1937; 2,258,737 Browne 10/1941; 2,325,549 Ryzowitz 7/1943; 2,480,963 Quinn 9/1949 …) and the same foreign document, CA 2096710 A1 (11/1994). Because I am reconstructing this from OCR of a family-member exhibit, I cannot guarantee that every individual entry I list below appears on the '060 front page specifically rather than on a sibling's. Treat the identity of the entries as reliable; treat the attribution to the '060 rather than a sibling as probable but not certified.

Also note: the '060 patent issued December 4, 2012, which is before the June 10, 2013 IPR petitions. Therefore the '060's own front page cannot cite the IPR proceedings. When you see "Inter Partes Review Case IPR2013‑00340—U.S. Pat. No. 8,323,060 (Claims 1‑9), Final Written Decision, Paper 79" in a (56) list, that is on a later family member (e.g., US 9,178,290 / 9,496,661), not on the '060. Don't cross-contaminate.

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1. The applicable § 102 framework (pre-AIA)

Application 13/523,668 was filed June 14, 2012, as a continuation of 12/633,792 filed December 8, 2009, claiming benefit of provisional 61/180,835 filed May 22, 2009. All effective filing dates pre-date March 16, 2013, so pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. § 102 governs. The relevant categories are:

• § 102(a) — known or used by others in the U.S., or patented or described in a printed publication in the U.S. or a foreign country, before the applicant's invention date.
• § 102(b) — patented or described in a printed publication, or in public use/on sale, more than one year before the U.S. filing date. With a Dec. 8, 2009 filing date, the critical date is December 8, 2008.
• § 102(e) — U.S. patent or published U.S. application, filed before the applicant's invention date.
• § 103(a) — obviousness (this is where every real fight in this family, including the '060's, actually happened).

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2. The references that actually mattered

These four are the substantive prior art. They were the grounds of the IPRs and were cited of record in the family. All are Exhibits in IPR2013‑00340/‑00342.

2.1 — "Matthews" — US 2006/0110977 A1

Description (from the IPR record). Discloses a coaxial cable connector 100 having a connector body 50, a post 40 with an external annular protrusion / flange 46 and a rearward end 42, and a nut/coupler 30 with a forward end 32, rearward end 34, and internal lip 36. It includes a connector body conductive member 80. Matthews also teaches that a post may be formed of a combination of conductive and non-conductive materials, including a metal coating or layer applied to a polymer (Petition claim chart, citing Ex. 1004 ¶ 0030). Figure 7 shows an embodiment with no continuity member between the coupler/nut and the connector body.

§ 102 anticipation analysis — which claims? None.
This is the single most important finding in your whole request, and it is on the record, not my inference: in IPR2013‑00342 the petitioner expressly conceded that the continuity-member limitation of independent claim 10 "is not expressly disclosed in Matthews." The Board recorded Corning's acknowledgement that "although Matthews discloses that connector 100 includes connector body conductive member 80, Matthews does not indicate that connector body conductive member 80 directly contacts post 40 so as to extend electrical grounding through nut 30 and connector body 50."

That missing element — a continuity member that itself contacts both the post and the nut (claim 1's "continuity base portion extending between the continuity post engaging surface of the post and the continuity body engaging surface of the connector body" plus "a continuity contact surface configured to be biased against the rearward facing lip surface") — is a limitation of every challenged independent claim. Because § 102 requires every element in a single reference, Matthews cannot anticipate claim 1, claim 10, or any of claims 2–9 or 11–25 that depend from them. Corning never argued otherwise; Matthews was used only as the primary reference in a § 103 combination.

Sub-note on the "rearward" placement: Matthews is nonetheless the closest single reference structurally, because its conductive member 80 sits behind the nut in a location overlapping the claimed region. An aggressive § 102 argument could be attempted against the location-only dependent claims (the "reside around"/"second end portion" family, e.g., claims 22–25 in the prior section's identification) — but it still fails on the "contacting the post and the nut" element, so it would fail as anticipation and is better pleaded as § 103.

2.2 — "Tatsuzuki" — Japanese published patent application

Description. Discloses a coaxial plug with a main plug body 11 (an integral post/body, i.e., not a separate connector body and post), a rotary mounting element 12, and a disc-shaped spring 13 having a ring-shaped surface 13a and spring pieces 13b. The spring is formed by stamp cutout processing of a thin metal plate possessing elasticity and is accommodated in a spring storage groove 11e. A second ring-shaped spring 14 sits in a spring housing part 12c, retained by a latching protrusion 12e. The post includes a curling-processed part 11f that is curled radially outward to engage the rotary engagement part 12d rotatably.

§ 102 anticipation analysis — which claims? None, standing alone.
Tatsuzuki's own disclosure affirmatively cuts against anticipation:

• It uses an integral plug body/post. Independent claims 1 and 10 require "a connector body" and "a post" that is "engageable with" / "configured to engage" the connector body. Corning had to reach for Montena to supply the separate body/post — a classic § 103 move, and an implicit admission that Tatsuzuki alone is missing a claim element.
• PPC's expert evidence (Ex. 1036, Dr. Eldering) established that Tatsuzuki's terms "accommodated"/"contained" describe only a loose relationship, and that the disc-shaped spring is not taught as in constant contact with the post. A § 102 case requires the reference to disclose the element as arranged in the claim, not merely to disclose parts that could be rearranged.

Accordingly, Tatsuzuki cannot anticipate claims 1–9 (the IPR2013‑00340 group) or claims 10–25 (the IPR2013‑00342 group). Its real role — and it is a strong role — is as the secondary reference supplying the "continuity member" / "disc-like portion + resilient flexible portion" structure in a § 103 combination. Notably, Tatsuzuki does map neatly onto the structural dependents: claim 8 ("disc-like portion and a resilient flexible portion … configured to arch away from a plane of the disc-like portion") and claim 9 ("a plurality of flexible portions … arched above the general plane of the disc"). If you are building an invalidity case, those are the claims where a Tatsuzuki-centered § 102/§ 103 attack is most efficient.

2.3 — "Montena"

Description. Discloses a connector using a separate connector body 24 and post member 26 (Fig. 1), and states that "in an alternative preferred embodiment, the connector body 24 and post member 26 can be formed integrally as a single piece" (col. 7, ll. 1–3). It teaches the material-selection advantage of separate components (col. 6, l. 65 – col. 7, l. 4).

§ 102 anticipation analysis — which claims? None.
Montena is pure structural/design-choice art. It discloses no continuity member at all — no conductive element extending grounding continuity between a post and a nut. It cannot anticipate any of claims 1–25. Its only function in the IPRs was to make the separate body/post two-part construction an obvious design choice over Tatsuzuki's integral body/post, supported by In re Kuhle, 526 F.2d 553 (C.C.P.A. 1975) (citing Metso Minerals v. Johnson Crushers, E.D. Wis. 2011). That is § 103 reasoning, full stop.

2.4 — US 7,097,499 B1 and US 2008/0248689 A1 (same-family, examiner-cited)

These two are the modern, on-point-looking entries of record, and neither was ever asserted as an anticipating reference. Practical note worth raising with counsel: because both are commonly owned with the '060 (John Mezzalingua Associates), if either were recharacterized as § 102(e)/(g) art rather than § 102(b) art, pre-AIA § 103(c)(1) could bar its use in an obviousness combination. But as § 102(b) art they are outside § 103(c)'s protection and available for both § 102 and § 103. Get the dates right before relying on this.

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3. The bulk of the front-page list (the "A" references)

The remainder of the (56) list is a long run of pre-1958 U.S. patents, for example:

331,169 Thomas 11/1885 · 1,371,742 Dringman 3/1921 · 1,667,485 MacDonald 4/1928 · 1,766,869 Austin 6/1930 · 1,801,999 Bowman 4/1931 · 1,885,761 Peirce, Jr. 11/1932 · 2,102,495 England 12/1937 · 2,258,737 Browne 10/1941 · 2,325,549 Ryzowitz 7/1943 · 2,480,963 Quinn 9/1949 · 2,544,654 Brown 3/1951 · 2,549,647 Turenne 4/1951 · 2,694,187 Nash 11/1954 · 2,754,487 Carr et al. 7/1956 · 2,755,331 Melcher 7/1956 · 2,757,351 Klostermann 7/1956 · 2,762,025 Melcher 9/1956 · 2,805,399 Leeper 9/1957 … (Continued)

plus the foreign document CA 2096710 A1 (11/1994).

Characterization. Every one of these is § 102(b) art (all published/issued more than a year before Dec. 8, 2009 — indeed more than half a century before). They are background/"A" references cited by the examiner to show the general state of coaxial-connector art: connector bodies, posts, threaded coupling nuts, internal lips, and grounding springs. None of them was cited as anticipating, and none of them anticipates any of claims 1–25 of the '060, because none discloses the claimed combination of (i) a separate connector body and post and (ii) a continuity member disposed only rearward of the forward-facing lip surface that contacts both the post and the nut so as to extend grounding continuity. I have not individually verified the subject matter of each of these ~60–90 entries in this session, and I am not going to characterize them one at a time from memory — that would be fabrication. What I can say with confidence is their evidentiary posture: they are § 102(b) printed publications/patents, useful for § 103 background and for the level of ordinary skill, not as anticipatory references.

Examiner's "Other Publications" of record in the family include the Digicon AVL Connector (ARRIS Group Inc., retrieved Apr. 22, 2010) and a Request for Inter Partes Reexamination (filed Sept. 13, 2012) of Purdy et al. US 8,192,237. Again — non-patent literature of marginal § 102 weight.

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4. Direct answer to "which claim(s) it potentially anticipates under § 102"

Stripped of hedging, the answer is uncomfortable but important:

On the record of this patent, no cited reference anticipates any claim of US 8,323,060. Every reference either (a) is generic background art, or (b) lacks at least one element of every independent claim — specifically, a continuity member that contacts both the post and the nut (or the "continuity base portion"/"continuity contact surface" pair of claim 1, or the "reside around an external portion of the connector body" element of claim 10). Every challenge actually made — in the IPRs and before the examiner — was a § 103 obviousness challenge, never a § 102 anticipation challenge.

If you want the strongest available § 102 theory (and you should know it is weak), it is a single-reference attack on the structural dependents using Tatsuzuki (for the disc-like/resilient-arched-flexible-portion limitations of claims 8 and 9) or using Matthews (for the location-only dependents). Neither survives the independent claims, so neither is a real anticipation case.

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5. What the citations were actually used for — the § 103 record

• IPR2013‑00340 (claims 1–9): obvious over Tatsuzuki in view of Montena and further in view of Matthews (per Dr. Mroczkowski's declaration for that proceeding). Final Written Decision Nov. 21, 2014, Paper 79.
• IPR2013‑00342 (claims 10–25): obvious over the combination of Matthews and Tatsuzuki. Final Written Decision Nov. 21, 2014, Paper 49.
• Federal Circuit, Feb. 22, 2016, 815 F.3d 747: reversed the Board's construction of "reside around" (holding it means "encircle or surround," not "in the immediate vicinity of; near") and vacated the rejection of claims 10–25; affirmed the Board's "axially lengthwise contact" finding for claim 13 on substantial evidence.
• Board Decision on Remand, Nov. 16, 2016 (Paper 89); appeal again, Dec. 15, 2016.
• Federal Circuit, July 3, 2018, consolidated nonprecedential appeal 2017‑1362/‑1363/‑1364: vacated again, citing (i) insufficient factual findings on the Matthews + Tatsuzuki combination, (ii) improper treatment of PPC's "SignalTight" commercial-success evidence, and (iii) failure to weigh unrebutted copying and failure-of-others evidence.
• Oct. 1, 2018: Board granted the joint motion and terminated IPR2013‑00340 under 35 U.S.C. § 317 after settlement.

Two consequences for your prior-art analysis:

1. The obviousness case was never affirmed. Do not treat Matthews + Tatsuzuki as a validated invalidity position; it was vacated twice on evidentiary/reasoning grounds and then settled away.
2. The prosecution history matters as much as the references. The claim language actually granted ("coupler," "continuity base portion," "continuity contact surface," "reside around") differs from the specification's Summary ("nut," "second end portion of the nut," "disposed axially rearward of a surface of the internal lip"). The applicant narrowed and re-drafted on the way to allowance. Any § 102/§ 103 reading of the cited art must be run against the granted claim text, not the Summary.

This is consistent with — and adds prior-art substance to — the previous section's findings; I found no contradiction.

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6. Explicit uncertainty flags

1. Front-page (56) list is not in the supplied authoritative text. I reconstructed it from OCR of PTAB exhibits and family-member front pages. Individual entries I quoted are reliable; the attribution of any given entry to the '060 (as opposed to sibling US 8,287,320 / 8,313,353 / 8,506,326 / 9,153,917 / 9,496,661) is probable, not certified. Verify against the '060's own front page or Patent Center.
2. Tatsuzuki's publication number and publication date are unverified. I will not guess a JP number or date. This is the single biggest gap in this report, and it matters because Tatsuzuki's § 102(a) vs. § 102(b) status (and its eligibility as prior art at all) turns on it.
3. "Montena" identity unverified. The IPR record says "Montena," Ex. 1003. A sibling patent's citation list shows 6,558,194 B2, 5/2003 to a name OCR'd as "Montana." I have not confirmed these are the same document.
4. Matthews's applicant/assignee unverified. The publication is to Roger Matthews; I did not confirm the assignee of record (commonly associated with Corning Gilbert, which was the IPR petitioner, but I did not verify).
5. The bulk 1885–1957 U.S. patents were not individually read in this session. I characterized them as a group. Do not quote me as having analyzed, e.g., 2,805,399 Leeper on its own substance.
6. No 2026 activity located for US 8,323,060, consistent with the prior section. Unchanged and not re-litigated here.

I'll pull the prior-art references cited on the Google Patents page for US 8,323,060 and the specific combinations the Board actually relied on, since those are the anchor for any §103 analysis.

Good — I've now got the actual grounds of record. Let me confirm the full prior-art reference set cited on the face of the patent and pin down the "Montana" reference used in the §103 grounds.

Obviousness Analysis — U.S. Patent No. 8,323,060 B2 (35 U.S.C. § 103)

0. A note on my source base, and one correction to the prior sections

The task asks me to use the Prior Art section of the Google Patents page. The full text supplied in this thread contains the bibliographic data and the "Prior art keywords" field (connector, nut, post, coaxial cable, continuity member) but omits the "References Cited" / "Cited By" listings themselves. I therefore reconstructed the reference set from (a) the frontal reference list of the same-specification family member US 9,680,263 B2 (Purdy et al.), and (b) the actual §103 record in the two IPRs against this patent. Provenance is flagged at each point. Do not treat the reference list in §2 as a verbatim transcription of the '060 front page.

Two corrections/updates to the previously generated sections:

1. Claim text is better than previously stated. The earlier "Patent summary" flagged that only key limitations of claims 1, 10, and 13 were verified. I have now recovered substantially verbatim claim 1 (from the Board's Sept. 17, 2018 paper in IPR2013-00340, citing '060 patent col. 20 l. 57 – col. 21 l. 39), plus verbatim element language for claims 7, 8, and 9 from Corning's petition claim charts. The claims use "coupler," "continuity base portion," and "continuity contact surface," which is not how the specification's Summary is drafted ("nut," "second end portion of the nut"). The earlier observation was correct; it now has evidentiary support.

2. Identifier trap — flagging, not auto-correcting. At least one secondary source (the PTAB Litigation Blog summary of PPC I) renders the patent as "U.S. Patent No. 8,313,060" alongside "8,313,353." The correct number for this patent is 8,323,060; 8,313,353 is a different, real patent in the same family (challenged in IPR2013-00345). Treat "8,313,060" appearing in that blog as a transcription error, but do not propagate it. A second trap: the family front page cites U.S. 7,828,595 ("Mathews"), which is a different reference from U.S. Pub. 2006/0110977 ("Matthews"). These are not typos for each other.

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1. Governing framework and procedural posture

Obviousness is assessed under Graham v. John Deere, 383 U.S. 1 (1966), per the four factual inquiries, with the KSR rationales supplying the "motivation to combine." Critically, this patent's §103 case has already been litigated to judgment — twice remanded and then settled, and that history is the single most important input to any opinion I give:

Sources: https://cases.justia.com/federal/appellate-courts/cafc/17-1362/17-1362-2018-07-03.pdf ; https://www.finnegan.com/a/web/[115890](/patent/115890)/2G4qV7/corning-ii-57.pdf ; https://www.finnegan.com/a/web/[115307](/patent/115307)/2G4qSp/ipr2013-00342-final-written-decision-35-usc-c2a7-318a-and-3.pdf ; https://www.ptabwatch.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/630/2016/11/PTAB-IPR2013-00342_54.pdf

Bottom line that drives everything below: the strongest §103 record ever assembled against this patent was rejected or left unresolved on the merits. Any fresh challenge today starts behind that record, not in front of it.

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2. The prior art of record

POSA: a designer of coaxial (F-type/CATV) connectors — typically a B.S. in mechanical or electrical engineering plus several years of RF-connector design experience. The specification itself supplies the field evidence: it recites as conventional that "typical component elements and structures of common connectors may permit loss of ground and discontinuity of the electromagnetic shielding" when a connector "is not properly tightened." That admission is the linchpin of the motivation analysis, because it concedes the problem was known.

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3. The core combination: Matthews + Tatsuzuki

Matthews discloses a coaxial connector 100 with a connector body 50, a post 40 having a flange 46, and a rotatable nut/coupler 30 with an internal lip 36. It also discloses a connector body conductive member 80. Matthews expressly contemplates a post formed of a combination of conductive and non-conductive materials with a metal coating or layer on a polymer — the basis for claim 7. Corning conceded below that Matthews' member 80 does not contact post 40 and does not reach the rearward-facing surface of the nut lip.

Tatsuzuki discloses a coaxial plug whose disc-shaped spring 13 — a stamped metal part with a ring-shaped interface 13a and resilient spring pieces 13b — is seated in a spring storage groove 11e and electrically bridges the plug body 11 (i.e., the post/body structure) and the rotary mounting element 12 (the nut). Its stated objective is that "even if the rotary mounting element is loosened, it prevents connection of grounding from becoming incomplete."

Motivation to combine (the KSR rationales actually invoked)

The Board and Corning relied on four, and they remain the best available:

1. Same field, same problem, known technique (KSR rationales (A), (C), (F)). Both references are coaxial connectors; both address grounding continuity across a rotatable nut; a POSA looking at Matthews' Fig. 7 configuration — which lacks any member between nut and body — would have recognized the benefit of adding a second, alternate ground path between nut 30, post 40, and body 50. Corning's rationale on the record was exactly this.
2. Predictable result. A conductive spring bridging the nut and the post does what conductive springs do: it maintains a low-resistance path across a rotating interface. There is no new mechanism.
3. Finite, identified solutions. The art at the time offered a small menu — conductive O-rings, spring fingers, disc springs, metallic braid — for the "loose connector ground" problem. KSR makes a finite set of predictable options obvious to try.
4. Advantageous in the specific Figure. Tatsuzuki's spring was argued to be "particularly advantageous" in Matthews' Fig. 7 embodiment, precisely because that embodiment lacked a nut-to-body continuity element.

Element mapping (claim 1)

Corning's petition charted every element. The mapping is credible for everything except the last clause:

Claims 8 and 9 map cleanly onto Tatsuzuki alone: ring-shaped interface 13a is the claimed "disc-like portion," and spring pieces 13b are "resilient flexible portion[s] … configured to arch away from a plane of the disc-like portion," with claim 9's "plurality of flexible portions forming symmetrical portions" reading on Tatsuzuki ¶[0017] and Fig. 7. Claim 7 (conductive coating) reads on Matthews ¶[0030].

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4. Where the §103 case is strong, and where it has failed

I want to be precise rather than persuasive, because this record cuts both ways.

Strong

• Claims 7, 8, 9 — essentially single-reference: Tatsuzuki discloses the arched, symmetric flexible disc spring; Matthews discloses conductive coatings. These were affirmed as obvious in the parallel '320 claims that lacked the continuity-maintenance limitation, and the PPC I court expressly affirmed the "shaped to fit"/"configured to fit" construction as merely requiring "a complementary size and shape," not facing or parallel surfaces. That construction defeats PPC's argument that perpendicular surfaces can't "fit."
• The structural location limitations ("disposed only rearward of the forward-facing lip surface"; "continuity base portion extending between …") — Tatsuzuki's spring is literally a conductive annulus held in a groove behind the nut's inward lip and spanning the post/body interface. Claim 13's "axial lengthwise contact" was expressly found, the Board reasoning that ring 13a's contact with the post has "a length of contact … beyond a point."

Failed / contested — and this is the decisive part

1. "Maintain electrical continuity." In PPC I, 815 F.3d at 744, the court held this phrase — not the term "continuity member" — requires "consistent or continuous contact," and that the Board had made no findings on it. On remand the Board tried to cure this with a "press fit" theory sourced only from Dr. Mroczkowski's deposition sketches.
2. The 2018 vacatur. The Federal Circuit vacated again, holding: (a) Tatsuzuki never discloses press-fitting, and its express teaching that the spring "is not pressed to the point of becoming crushed flat and does not lose its spring operation" is a teaching away; (b) Dr. Mroczkowski conceded he had never done press-fit designs; (c) the Board ignored that testimony, in violation of the APA. See https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/us-federal-circuit/[1941643](/patent/1941643).html
3. "Reside around" (claim 10, and location claims 13, 14, 22–25). Construed as "encircle or surround" (PPC I, 815 F.3d 747), the Board on remand found Corning had NOT proven claims 10–25 unpatentable.
4. Objective indicia. Both courts held the Board erred on: presumption of nexus for PPC's "SignalTight" products; PPC's unrebutted evidence of Corning's failed attempts to build a continuity-member prototype; and copying.

Consequence for a fresh §103 theory: the Matthews+Tatsuzuki combination, standing alone, is insufficient as a matter of record for (i) any claim carrying "maintain electrical continuity" (claims 1–9 of the '060) and (ii) claim 10 and its location dependents. A competent challenge would have to fix the two identified defects.

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5. Combinations that would repair the defects

Combination A — Matthews + Tatsuzuki + Bence (U.S. 7,114,990). Already used in the parallel '353 proceeding. The Board treated Bence as evidence of the level of ordinary skill supporting the Matthews+Tatsuzuki combination. Its value here is different and better: Bence discloses a metal spring grounding member disposed between the coupler/nut and the tubular post, i.e., exactly the structural teaching the Board was accused of importing by "press fitting." A challenger could use Bence as an express teaching of a resident, continuously contacting spring at the nut/post interface — supplying the missing factual finding without the "press-fit" hindsight problem. (Caveat: PPC successfully argued in a related IPR that Bence post-dates some PPC patents and that its embodiments place the spring between coupler and post, not coupler and body. Prior-art status must be independently established against the '060's May 22, 2009 priority date.)

Combination B — Tatsuzuki + Montana + Matthews. This is the alternative ground Corning actually pleaded for claims 1–6, 8, and 9 (per Dr. Mroczkowski's declaration, https://ocr.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2013-00345/.../Exhibit-2013-Mroczkowski_Decl___IPR2013_00340_Exhibit_1007.pdf). Because the -00340 proceeding was terminated by settlement before this ground was adjudicated, it remains legally unexhausted and un-estoppled. It should be re-verified before any reliance; I could not confirm the identity of "Montana" from available sources.

Combination C — Matthews + Tatsuzuki + a spring-energized-ring reference. The family face cites several candidates that, if they show a resilient conductive ring permanently biased between the nut lip and the post, directly supply the "maintain electrical continuity … when the post moves relative to the coupler" finding: U.S. 5,975,951 (Burns), 7,179,121 (Burris), 7,674,132 (Chen), 7,828,595 (Mathews), and US 2010/0081322 (Malloy). Note the "Mathews"/"Matthews" distinction flagged in §0 — cite the full publication number, never the surname.

Combination D — add the "variability of ground path" references. In a related PPC IPR, the Board found that the art taught "different structures to provide grounding shield path(s) through a coaxial cable connector," including Youtsey (6,712,631) and Palinkas (6,716,062). That finding is reusable as a KSR rationale (D): if the field accepted multiple grounding-path topologies, placing a continuity member on the rearward side of the nut lip is applying a known technique to a known device ready for improvement.

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6. Claim-by-claim §103 summary (my assessment)

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7. Explicit uncertainty flags

1. The '060 front-page "References Cited" list was not retrieved. The reference table in §2 is built from a same-specification family member (US 9,680,263 B2) and the IPR record. Verify against the '060 front page or Patent Center before filing anything.
2. "Montana" is unidentified. I will not guess its number.
3. "Mathews" (US 7,828,595) vs. "Matthews" (US 2006/0110977) are distinct; a single character separates a real primary reference from a real secondary one.
4. Some sources render this patent as "8,313,060." That is a transcription artifact; 8,313,353 is a genuinely different family member.
5. The final merits adjudication of claims 1–9 never happened — IPR2013-00340 ended in settlement after the 2018 vacatur. Do not describe the '060 claims as either "upheld" or "held invalid." They are unadjudicated after two remands, and the claims 10–25 record affirmatively favors the patent owner.
6. Date inconsistency in my instructions: the task header states April 26, 2026 while the system date is September 30, 2026. This does not affect the §103 substance (which turns on law and record, not the calendar), but I am flagging it rather than silently reconciling it.
7. No 2026 appellate activity was found for this patent; the last activity of record remains the October 2018 settlement. Absence of evidence is not proof of absence — confirm via PACER/CM-ECF and the Patent Center litigation tab for application 13/523,668.