US 9722363

I'll search for authoritative information on US 9,722,363, including any 2026 CAFC activity.

Let me run more targeted searches for litigation/PTAB activity and the current assignee record.

Let me look for the claim text and check whether US 9,722,363 was among the patents in the 2026 CAFC appeal.

US 9,722,363 B2 — Concise Summary

Caution up front: The authoritative full-text fetch I was given for US 9,722,363 includes the abstract, summary, and detailed description but no separately rendered "Claims" section. The independent-claim overview below is therefore derived from the three "aspects" recited in that document's Summary of the Detailed Description, which in this family track the independent claims — but the verbatim claim wording has not been verified against the official USPTO claim set and should be checked before being relied on.

Bibliographic data (from the fetched Google Patents record and spec)

Continuity: The '363 patent states it is a continuation of U.S. App. Ser. No. 13/653,095, filed Oct. 16, 2012 ("Coaxial Cable Connector With Integral RFI Protection"), and is related to App. Ser. No. 13/198,765 (filed Aug. 5, 2011) and App. Ser. No. 13/652,969 (filed Oct. 16, 2012). App. Ser. No. 13/653,095 issued as US 9,287,659 (Mar. 15, 2016), which is not the same patent as the '363 — do not conflate them. Google's "Other versions / priority to" entries also show children US 9,912,105 (App. 15/636,842) and US 10,236,636 (App. 15/874,306).

Abstract (verbatim)

"A coaxial cable connector for coupling an end of a coaxial cable to a terminal is disclosed. The connector has a coupler adapted to couple the connector to a terminal, a body assembled with the coupler and a post assembled with the coupler and the body. The post is adapted to receive an end of a coaxial cable. The post has an integral contacting portion that is monolithic with at least a portion of the post. When assembled the coupler and post provide at least one circuitous path resulting in RF shielding such that RF signals external to the coaxial cable connector are attenuated, such that the integrity of an electrical signal transmitted through coaxial cable connector is maintained regardless of the tightness of the coupling of the connector to the terminal."

Plain-language overview of the independent claims

Based on the three aspects in the Summary section (each of which reads as a distinct independent claim):

Aspect/Independent Claim 1 — Coupler + post shielding with thread pitch-angle mismatch.
A coaxial cable connector with a coupler, a body, and a post. The coupler attaches the connector to an equipment connection port. The coupler has a step and a threaded portion that mates with the port's threads, and — the distinguishing feature — at least one thread on the coupler has a pitch angle different from the pitch angle of at least one thread of the port. The body is assembled with the coupler; the post is assembled with both and receives the cable end. The coupler and post together provide RF shielding such that external RF signals are attenuated by at least about 50 dB in a range up to about 1000 MHz, measured transfer impedance averages about 0.24 ohms, and signal integrity is maintained regardless of how tight the coupling is. Dependent-type matter mentioned: the pitch angle difference is about 2 degrees; as a non-limiting example, coupler thread pitch angle about 62° vs. port thread pitch angle about 60°.

Aspect/Independent Claim 2 — Integral/monolithic contacting portion on the post.
A connector with a coupler, a body, and a post, in which the post has an integral contacting portion that is monolithic with at least a portion of the post. When assembled, the coupler and post provide at least one circuitous path producing RF shielding, so that external RF signals (ingress and/or egress) are attenuated and signal integrity is maintained regardless of coupling tightness. Dependent features recited in the summary: attenuation of at least about 50 dB up to about 1000 MHz and transfer impedance averaging about 0.24 ohms; the at least one circuitous path comprising first and second circuitous paths; the coupler comprising a lip and a step and the post comprising a flange and a shoulder, with the first circuitous path established by at least one of the step, lip, flange, contacting portion and shoulder; and the second circuitous path established by the coupler's threaded portion and the port's threaded portion, with the coupler thread pitch angle different from the port thread pitch angle.

Aspect/Independent Claim 3 — Two circuitous paths combination.
A connector with coupler, body, and post where: the coupler has a step and a threaded portion, with at least one coupler thread having a pitch angle different from a port thread pitch angle; the body is assembled with the coupler; the post is assembled with the coupler and body and has a flange, a contacting portion, and a shoulder. A first circuitous path is established by the step, flange, contacting portion and shoulder; a second circuitous path is established by the coupler threaded portion and the port threaded portion. Together they provide RF shielding with ≥ about 50 dB attenuation up to about 1000 MHz and transfer impedance averaging about 0.24 ohms, with signal integrity maintained regardless of coupling tightness. Dependent matter: pitch-angle difference of about 2° (e.g., 62° coupler vs. 60° port).

Supporting disclosure relevant to the claims: the specification defines "electrical continuity" as DC contact resistance from the cable outer conductor to the equipment port of less than about 3000 milliohms, and elsewhere describes reducing it to less than about 100, 50, 30, or 10 milliohms. FIG. 21–25 describe circuitous paths 900 (coupler/body/post interface via step 235, shoulder 345, contacting portion 310, flange 312) and 902 (coupler threads to port threads), and FIG. 25 shows the 0–1000 MHz shielding plot measured with the coupler finger-tightened and then loosened two full turns, i.e., under deliberately loose conditions.

CAFC / 2026 docket check — what I could and could not confirm

• I found no 2026 Federal Circuit docket entry naming US 9,722,363 specifically. I cannot state that the '363 patent is in any 2026 CAFC appeal.
• The only evidently relevant 2026 CAFC item located is PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Amphenol Corp., Nos. 2024-1776, -1777, -1778, -1779 (Fed. Cir.), decided March 4, 2026 as a nonprecedential Rule 36 affirmance (Panel: Reyna, Hughes, Cunningham), on appeal from PTAB IPR2022-00718, -00719, -00720, -00721. The judgment as published does not identify the challenged patent numbers, so I cannot confirm whether US 9,722,363 was among them.
• Related but distinct 2025–2026 activity surfaces in searches: Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC v. PPC Broadband, Inc., IPR2014-00440 (Paper 68, Aug. 18, 2015), designated precedential Oct. 28, 2025 on the real-party-in-interest requirement; and ongoing PPC/Amphenol PTAB matters (IPR2022-00830/831/946/947/1087/1088). Neither is tied to the '363 patent in the material I retrieved.
• Historical family-level litigation (not proven to involve the '363 patent): PPC Broadband v. Corning Gilbert, N.D.N.Y. No. 5:13-cv-00538; PPC v. Corning Optical Communications RF, ITC Inv. No. 337-TA-938; and Google Patents' assignment history showing the patent moving from Corning Optical Communications LLC → Corning Optical Communications RF LLC → PPC Broadband, Inc. on 2021-11-15.

Uncertainty / items to verify against primary sources

1. Exact claim text, claim count, and figure count for the '363 patent — not present in the fetch I was given. Verify in USPTO Patent Center / Patent Public Search.
2. Whether the three "aspects" in the Summary correspond one-to-one to independent claims — likely, but unverified.
3. Current ownership — PPC Broadband, Inc. per recorded assignment (2021-11-15); confirm via USPTO Assignment Search, since Google notes its assignee list "may be inaccurate."
4. IPR2022-00718–-00721 patent numbers — needed to test whether the March 2026 CAFC judgment affects the '363 patent.
5. Note a same-titled but different patent, US 9,762,008 B2 (Burris & Miller, App. 14/872,842, filed Oct. 1, 2015, issued Sep. 12, 2017, Corning Optical Communications RF LLC) — do not merge it with the '363.

Primary source used: https://patents.google.com/patent/US9722363/en (fetched 2026-09-29).

I'll search for litigation involving US 9,722,363 specifically.

The first pass returned mostly irrelevant results. Let me run more targeted searches.

Litigation Search — US 9,722,363 B2

Bottom line

I found no litigation, ITC investigation, PTAB proceeding, or Federal Circuit appeal in which US 9,722,363 ("the '363 patent") is identified as a patent-in-suit or challenged patent. The web searches I was able to run did not surface a single case caption, complaint, claim-construction order, IPR petition, or docket entry naming US 9,722,363 specifically.

Given the operating rule to say so plainly rather than fill gaps: on the record I retrieved, I cannot report plaintiff/defendant/jurisdiction/case-number/filing-date/outcome for any case involving the '363 patent, because I did not find such a case. Below I explain what I did find, what is adjacent but distinct, and what remains genuinely unverified.

What I searched (and the limits)

Tooling limitation — stated explicitly: I was working from a general web-search tool. I could not directly query the Unified Patents litigation portal, PACER, or USPTO Patent Center / PTAB API in this session. Cases settled or dismissed early, or asserted only in complaints not indexed by the search engine, would not appear. This is a real gap, not a clean negative.

Adjacent / family-related proceedings I did find (none verified to include the '363)

Important — do not conflate

The following are numerically or thematically similar but legally distinct from US 9,722,363. I flag them because they are the most likely sources of false "matches":

• US 9,762,008 B2 — same title ("Coaxial cable connector with integral RFI protection"), same lead inventor area (Burris), but a different patent (App. 14/872,842). Already flagged in the prior sections; reconfirming.
• US 9,287,659 — this is what the '363's parent application, Ser. No. 13/653,095, issued as. The '363 is a continuation of that application. A suit asserting the '659 is not a suit asserting the '363.
• BVA "Citation NR: 9722363" — a Board of Veterans' Appeals decision, not a patent.
• US 9,225,083 B2 — the one patent I could positively tie to the Amphenol IPR set (IPR2022-00721). Not the '363.

Refinement to a point in the previously generated sections

The earlier summary stated, regarding the March 4, 2026 Federal Circuit item: "The judgment as published does not identify the challenged patent numbers, so I cannot confirm whether US 9,722,363 was among them."

That remains substantively correct — the published Rule 36 judgment (24-1776, PDF at cafc.uscourts.gov) lists only the PTAB proceeding numbers, not the patents. However, a PTAB Notice of Appeal filed 2024-04-29 in IPR2022-00721 identifies that proceeding's patent as US 9,225,083 B2. So at least one of the four is not the '363. This is a refinement, not a contradiction — the remaining three (IPR2022-00718, -00719, -00720) are still unidentified in my retrieved material.

What would resolve this definitively

To close the gap I could not close with the tools available:

1. USPTO Patent Center / PTAB API for US 9,722,363 — lists any IPR/PGR, reexam, or reissue.
2. Unified Patents litigation portal (portal.unifiedpatents.com/litigation) — search "9722363."
3. PACER / CourtListener docket search on the literal string 9,722,363.
4. USPTO Assignment Search — the '363 moved Corning → Corning Optical Communications RF LLC (2017) → PPC Broadband, Inc. (recorded 2021-11-15). Because it was a Corning patent that only recently passed to PPC, any pre-2021 assertion would have been by Corning against PPC, and any post-2021 assertion would be by PPC — a date split that meaningfully narrows where to look.
5. The IPR2022-00718/-00719/-00720 petition documents, to identify their patents and rule the '363 in or out.

Net answer to the question as posed: No litigation involving US 9,722,363 is known on the record retrieved. I am not asserting none exists — I am asserting the searches did not find any, and that the related cases above are all, so far as the retrieved documents show, different patents.

I'll verify the canonical "no PTAB activity" signal from the ODP block against live sources, since the task warns the API may lag reality.

Let me check specifically for the '363 number and its family members in PTAB/E2E records.

Let me check patent-specific databases (Unified Patents portal, ex parte.ai, and PTAB E2E-style sources) for the '363 number directly.

PTAB Analysis — US 9,722,363 B2 ("Coaxial cable connector with integral RFI protection")

Bottom line from the canonical source first: the structured "PTAB proceedings on file" block — sourced from the USPTO Open Data Portal — states that no AIA trial proceedings exist for this patent as of the most recent ingest. My live web searches (Google Patents PTAB-adjacent results, Docket Alarm, Justia/CAFC, PTAB E2E-derived petition documents, and practitioner trackers) surfaced no IPR, PGR, or CBM naming US 9,722,363, and no petition document referencing it. I therefore report zero proceedings, and I flag below everything in the adjacent corporate/patent-family docket that a defendant will inevitably be told is "the '363 IPR" — it is not.

Proceedings overview

Total AIA trial proceedings on US 9,722,363: 0 (active: 0 / claims invalidated: 0 / claims sustained: 0 / settled: 0 / institution denied: 0).

The defensive posture this creates is not "the patent has survived two IPRs and is hardened," and it is not "claims 1–5 have been canceled." It is the third, less comfortable posture: the patent is entirely untested at the Board. No Final Written Decision exists to cite, no claim has been canceled by the PTAB, and no § 315(e)(2) estoppel runs against anybody. A defendant today has the full statutory toolkit available against the '363, but it must build its invalidity case from scratch — using the family's 2013–2017 Corning-vs-PPC prior-art corpus as a starting point, not as an estoppel-shielded outcome.

Tool availability note (practitioner-relevant): the '363 carries an earliest priority of 2012-10-16 and issued from a 2016 continuation of a 2012 application. Because its effective filing date precedes 2013-03-16, PGR is unavailable, and a coaxial cable connector is not a "covered business method" patent, so CBM is unavailable. IPR (§ 311–319) is the only AIA trial vehicle that can reach this patent. There is also no reissue or reexamination on file that I found.

Per-proceeding detail

None to report. No proceeding numbers exist to list, and I will not invent any. The correct entry for this patent is:

No AIA trial proceedings on file (USPTO ODP), corroborated by web search as of 2026-09-29.

Adjacent proceedings — NOT on the '363 (do not cite these as '363 outcomes)

These are the matters that routinely get mis-attributed to this patent because they involve the same parties (PPC Broadband / Corning Optical Communications RF) and the same technology space (coaxial cable connector RFI/grounding). None of them is an AIA trial on US 9,722,363.

IPR2016-01569 (and companion IPR2016-01573) — Corning Optical Communications RF LLC, Corning Incorporated, and Corning Optical Communications LLC v. PPC Broadband, Inc.

• Type: Inter Partes Review
• Filed: 2016-08-09
• Patent challenged: U.S. Patent No. 8,075,338 — not the '363
• Status: Terminated — settlement before institution (2017-01-17)
• Judge panel: James Arpin, Josiah Cocks, Sheila McShane
• Key procedural event: Joint Motion to Terminate filed 2017-01-12, with an Order of Dismissal (Ex. 2032) from the related litigation; the Board terminated before any institution decision.
• Why it matters to the '363: PPC's exhibit list in this proceeding included Ex. 2003, U.S. Patent No. 9,287,659 — the parent of the '363 (App. Ser. No. 13/653,095). So a sibling of the '363 was being used as prior art against a Corning patent in this window. This is a relationship to track, not an outcome.
• Defensive value: Zero estoppel value. Termination before institution means no FWD, no claim rulings, and no estoppel. It does confirm that Corning and PPC settled this family's 2016 disputes rather than finishing them at the Board.
• Sources: IPR2016-01569 docket; Patent Owner exhibit list and power-of-attorney filings retrieved via Docket Alarm.

IPR2014-00440, IPR2014-00441, IPR2014-00736 — Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC v. PPC Broadband, Inc.

• Type: Inter Partes Review
• Status: Dismissed — petitioner failed to name its parent and sister companies as real parties-in-interest; Request for Rehearing denied 2015-12-09 (Bonilla, APJ); Decisions to Institute vacated. Per the previously generated section, the decision was designated precedential on 2025-10-28 on the RPI requirement.
• Patents challenged: not confirmed by me — I could not verify the patent numbers from the retrieved material, and I will not guess. Verify on PTAB E2E before relying on this.
• Defensive value: The key cautionary lesson for any defendant drafting a petition against the '363: name every RPI. If you're petitioning as a subsidiary, jointly with a manufacturer customer, or with indemnitor involvement, this precedential line is a dismissal trap.

PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Amphenol Corp., IPR2022-00718 / -00719 / -00720 / -00721 → Fed. Cir. Nos. 2024-1776, -1777, -1778, -1779

• Type: Inter Partes Review (four proceedings), appealed
• Petitioner: Amphenol Corp.; Patent Owner: PPC Broadband, Inc.
• Patents challenged (per Petitioner's expert declaration): U.S. Pat. Nos. 10,965,063 ('063); 10,446,983 ('983); 10,038,284 ('284); 9,225,083 ('083) — none is the '363.
• Grounds: two obviousness combinations — Ground 1: Youtsey (US 6,042,422) + Lionetto (US 4,929,188) + Horak (US 3,879,102); Ground 2: Tarrant (US 5,083,943) + Bell (US 5,882,226).
• Federal Circuit: Judgment entered 2026-03-04, docket numbers 2024-1776 through 2024-1779, AFFIRMED under Fed. Cir. R. 36 (nonprecedential) — per curiam (Reyna, Hughes, Cunningham). PPC (the appellant, and now owner of the '363) lost. Argument for appellant: Robert King High, III (Finnegan); for appellee: Gabriel K. Bell (Latham & Watkins).
• Defensive value: Not a '363 outcome, but strategically significant: PPC has now had four connector-family IPR losses affirmed on Rule 36, and the Amphenol family of art (Youtsey/Lionetto/Horak, Tarrant/Bell) is proven Board-tested against PPC's connector claims. A defendant challenging the '363 should pull the full Amphenol petition record.
• Source: Justia — PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Amphenol Corp., Nos. 2024-1776 et al. (Fed. Cir. 2026-03-04)

Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC v. PPC Broadband, Inc., Fed. Cir. Nos. 15-1361, -1366, -1368, -1369 and 15-1364 (Fed. Cir. 2016-02-22)

• The 2013-vintage IPR wave (IPR2013-00342, -00346, -00347, etc.) against PPC connector patents, decided 2016-02-22 (Moore, J.), affirmed in part, vacated and remanded in part (claim construction under BRI; secondary considerations/commercial success presumption). This is where the modern "continuity member" connector jurisprudence comes from.
• Timing point that matters: the '363's parent ('659) did not issue until 2016-03-15. The '363 itself issued 2017-08-01. The 2013–2016 IPR wave therefore could not have challenged the '363 — it did not yet exist as an issued patent. That structural fact is the most likely explanation for the blank docket.
• Source: National Law Review summary of the 2016-02-22 decision

PPC Broadband as petitioner (not a '363 matter)

PPC itself has been an aggressive petitioner: IPR2022-00830, -00831, -00946, -00947, -01087, -01088 against Times Fiber Communications patents (US 10,913,632; 10,589,957; 10,988,342; 11,001,471; 10,941,016; 10,906,771); outcomes included institution denied after patent-owner disclaimer (-00830, -00831) and Final Written Decisions finding all challenged claims unpatentable (-01087 on the '016 patent, decided 2023-12-06, panel: Gerstenblith, Hoskins, Ippolito). Also surfaced: IPR2022-01523 (PerfectVision Manufacturing v. PPC) — institution denied; IPR2023-01363 (Amphenol v. PPC) — FWD. I could not confirm which PPC patent each of the latter two targets. Do not assume they involve the '363.

Strategic summary

Claim status of the '363. Every claim of US 9,722,363 stands exactly as issued. No claim is CANCELED, none is SUSTAINED-by-FWD, and all are UNTESTED. No AIA trial has ever been instituted against it, so there is no Board certificate cancelling anything and no FWD to quote. (Caveat carried forward from the prior section: the fetched full text contains no separately rendered claims section, so the exact claim count and verbatim wording of the independent claims is unverified; the three "aspects" in the Summary of the Detailed Description are the likely independents but must be confirmed in Patent Center before any claim-level statement is made.)

Estoppel landscape. Because no FWD has ever issued on the '363, § 315(e)(2) estoppel is a non-issue — no petitioner and no privy is barred from raising any ground, and the patent owner has no estoppel-based riposte. Equally, no § 315(b) one-year clock is running: the clock only starts on service of a complaint alleging infringement of the '363. If PPC asserts the '363 against a new defendant today, that defendant has a full year from service to file. The practical prior-art corpus still open includes everything from the 2013–2016 Corning petitions against the connector family (continuity-member/grounding art) and the 2021–2026 Amphenol art (Youtsey, Lionetto, Horak, Tarrant, Bell) — none of it burdened by estoppel as to the '363.

Pattern signals. (1) The '363's family has been at war for over a decade, but always on other patents — never this one. (2) PPC Broadband, Inc. took ownership on 2021-11-15 and is a sophisticated, repeat PTAB player on both sides of the v., with proven willingness to appeal to the Federal Circuit (as it did in the Amphenol appeals, losing on Rule 36 in 2026-03). (3) I found no evidence of Unified Patents or any defensive aggregator in the chain for this patent. (4) The strongest inference from the blank '363 docket is structural, not tactical: the patent issued in 2017, after the 2013–2016 IPR campaigns closed, and the post-2021 campaigns were fought over the newer-generation connector patents (the '083/'284/'063/'983/'016 family) that PPC actually asserts in litigation such as PPC Broadband v. Amphenol, D. Del. No. 1:21-cv-00654.

Recommended next steps

1. Treat the '363 as live and un-narrowed. If you received a demand letter or complaint citing it, there is no FWD to cite back. Do not accept any assertion that "the claims were invalidated" — no AIA trial has ever been instituted on this patent. Verify the asserted claim numbers in the complaint against the issued patent, since the independent-claim identification is unverified on my side.
2. Verify the claim set first. Pull US 9,722,363 from USPTO Patent Center / Patent Public Search and confirm the claim count and independent-claim text before building a chart or an invalidity contention.
3. Confirm the blank docket against a second source. Re-query PTAB E2E, the ODP AIA trial endpoint, and Docket Alarm/Ex Parte for "9,722,363." The ODP block is authoritative as of its ingest, but confirm no post-ingest petition was filed (e.g., a defendant served in a 2025–2026 complaint would have had until one year post-service to petition).
4. Build the invalidity record from the family litigation, not from a '363 FWD. The two corpora worth mining are (a) the Corning v. PPC 2013–2016 IPR petitions and the Fed. Cir. 15-1361/15-1364 decisions, and (b) the Amphenol petitions in IPR2022-00718/-00719/-00720/-00721 (Youtsey, Lionetto, Horak, Tarrant, Bell), whose Rule 36 affirmance on 2026-03-04 confirms the Board's treatment of that art against PPC connector claims.
5. If you petition, protect your filing date. Given Corning Optical Communications RF v. PPC Broadband (IPR2014-00440 line, precedential on RPI per the prior section), name every real party in interest — parent, sister entities, and any manufacturer/indemnitor with control. Dismissal on RPI grounds vacates institution and destroys your filing date.
6. Watch for a future petition. With the '363 now in PPC's portfolio and PPC actively litigating the connector family, a first-ever IPR on the '363 is a realistic future development. There are no current statutory milestones to track (no institution decision deadline, no oral hearing, no FWD due date) because no trial exists — any IPR would run on the standard filing → 6-month institution deadline → 12-month FWD deadline from institution (§ 316(a)(11)) track.

Confidence and honesty notes

• High confidence: No AIA trial proceeding on US 9,722,363 appears in the canonical ODP block or in my web searches. The Amphenol IPR2022-00718/-00719/-00720/-00721 patents, the 2026-03-04 Rule 36 affirmance and its docket numbers, and the IPR2016-01569 termination before institution are all grounded in retrieved sources.
• Could not confirm: the patents challenged in IPR2014-00440/-00441/-00736 and in IPR2022-01523 / IPR2023-01363. I have listed them as adjacent only and expressly declined to assign them a target patent.
• Unverified carry-over: the exact claim count/text of the '363 (no claims section in the fetched document), and whether the three Summary "aspects" map one-to-one to independent claims.
• No contradiction with the previously generated sections was found; the "no PTAB activity" default is corroborated rather than contradicted. One item to re-verify independently: the prior section's statement that the IPR2014-00440 decision was designated precedential on 2025-10-28 — I carried it forward but did not independently reconfirm the designation date.

I'll research the assignment chain through the available sources before writing anything.

Let me dig for the specific assignment records, reel/frame, correspondents, and the nature of the Corning→PPC transfer.

Ownership & Assignment Reconstruction — US 9,722,363 B2

Data-retrieval limitation (read first). My searches did not return the USPTO Assignment Center record set for the '363 patent — I could not retrieve reel/frame numbers, execution dates, or the correspondent of record for any link in this chain. What I can report is the assignment-event history mirrored on the Google Patents "legal events" tab, which is derived from recorded assignment data, plus corroborating court/PTAB filings. I am flagging every field I could not verify rather than filling it in. Nothing below is fabricated.

Inventors

• No unusual inventor-departure pattern is evidenced. Both inventors are Arizona-based (Peoria/Glendale) engineers tied to the Corning Gilbert coaxial-connector operation, and the assignee of record for the inventor-to-company conveyance was Corning Gilbert — not an unrelated buyer. There is no evidence in the material retrieved of inventors exiting the original assignee within 12 months of filing.
• App. 15/019,498 (the application that issued as the '363) is a continuation; the underlying inventive entity dates to the 2012 parent. The inventors are the same two named on the parent '095 filing.

Original assignee

• On the face of the record: the application was filed with Corning Optical Communications LLC as the applicant (Google legal events: "2016-02-09 — Application filed by Corning Optical Communications LLC"), and the issued patent's assignee of record at grant was effectively the Corning RF entity. However, the recorded conveyance of the inventors' interest names Corning Gilbert (which became Corning Optical Communications RF LLC by name change). See the contradiction flag below.
• Primary line of business: Corning Optical Communications RF LLC is the coaxial/RF connector business historically known as Corning Gilbert Inc. (formerly Gilbert Engineering), based at 5310 W. Camelback Road, Glendale, AZ — an operating connector manufacturer, not a licensing entity. It is a subsidiary within the Corning Incorporated (NYSE: GLW) optical-communications segment.
• Did it ship product embodying the claims? Yes — the Corning Gilbert/RF entity manufactured and sold the UltraRange and UltraShield series coaxial connectors (N.D.N.Y. No. 5:11-cv-00761; No. 5:12-cv-00911; No. 5:13-cv-00538). These are the same product lines from which the integral-continuity/RFI technology in this family arose.
• Current status of the original assignee: Not operating as an independent patent owner. The Corning RF connector portfolio was transferred out on 2021-11-15 (see below). Corning Incorporated itself remains a going concern and is not in bankruptcy.

Contradiction flag vs. the earlier section: the prior summary lists the original assignee as Corning Optical Communications LLC. Consistent with that, Google's filing event says the application was "filed by Corning Optical Communications LLC," while Google's assignment events show the inventors assigning to Corning Gilbert and a subsequent change of name to Corning Optical Communications RF LLC. These are two different Corning legal entities and both cannot be the sole "original assignee" without an intra-Corning step that the retrieved data does not show. This must be reconciled against the actual assignment PDFs at Assignment Center.

Assignment timeline

Every entry below is from Google Patents "legal events," which does not expose reel/frame or correspondent. Those two fields are marked "not retrieved" and are not invented.

• Execution date not retrieved / recorded 2017-06-28 — Reel not retrieved

  • Conveyance: Assignment of Assignors' Interest
  • Assignor: Burris, Donald Andrew; Lutz, William Bernard
  • Assignee: Corning Gilbert (Inc.)
  • Correspondent: not retrieved
  • Context: Initial conveyance of inventors' rights to the employer/subsidiary — the ordinary inventor-to-company assignment for this Connector family.

• Execution date not retrieved / recorded 2017-06-28 — Reel not retrieved

  • Conveyance: Change of Name
  • Assignor: Corning Gilbert (Inc.)
  • Assignee: Corning Optical Communications RF LLC
  • Correspondent: not retrieved
  • Context: Internal corporate rebrand/name change only — no change in beneficial ownership.

• Execution date not retrieved / recorded 2021-11-15 — Reel not retrieved

  • Conveyance: Assignment of Assignors' Interest
  • Assignor: Corning Optical Communications RF LLC
  • Assignee: PPC Broadband, Inc.
  • Correspondent: not retrieved
  • Context: Third-party transfer of the Corning RF (Corning Gilbert) connector portfolio to PPC Broadband, Inc., a Belden subsidiary — an acquisition/portfolio transfer, not a name change (assignor and assignee are unrelated parties). Whether this was an asset sale, a portfolio sale, or part of a broader business divestiture is not verified in the material retrieved.

Regarding the "reel/frame" and "correspondent" fields the task asks for: they exist in Assignment Center for these conveyances (the USPTO makes assignment documents downloadable by reel/frame since the policy change described in the IAM note), but my searches did not surface them. I am explicitly declining to supply placeholder reel numbers or a guessed correspondent.

One near-miss, clearly labeled as NOT this patent's record: PPC's prosecution correspondence of record runs to Barclay Damon LLP (ipdocket@barclaydamon.com, One Park Place, 300 South State Street, Syracuse, NY 13202) and PPC's litigation counsel has been Hiscock & Barclay → Barclay Damon LLP (Denis J. Sullivan, Reg. No. 47,980; Douglas J. Nash). This is PPC's counsel of record in other matters (e.g., PTAB petitions and the PPC/Corning litigations), not evidence of who filed the '363 assignment recordations. Do not treat it as the '363 correspondent without the reel/frame PDF.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 9722363
    2012 : Original parent application filed
    2016 : Continuation filed as 15 019 498
         : Published as US 2016 0156134 A1
    2017 : Inventors assign to Corning Gilbert
         : Corning Gilbert renamed Corning RF LLC
         : Patent issues as US 9722363 B2
    2021 : Assigned to PPC Broadband Inc
    2022 : PPC asserts patents in PTAB and district court

NPE / troll-pattern signals

Verdict

Operating-company assertion.

The only substantive third-party transfer in the chain is the 2021-11-15 recordation of the Corning Optical Communications RF LLC → PPC Broadband, Inc. assignment; every other recorded step is either the inventors' initial assignment to Corning Gilbert or a change of name only (Corning Gilbert → Corning Optical Communications RF LLC), both recorded 2017-06-28. PPC Broadband, Inc. is a Delaware corporation and a Belden brand headquartered at 6176 East Molloy Road, East Syracuse, NY — an active manufacturer of coaxial connectors that ships product and sues actual competitors (Corning, Amphenol, CommScope, Times Fiber) rather than a licensing shell. No shell-entity, known-asserter, cascading-transfer, fire-sale, privateering, or defensive-aggregator signal is present; the correspondent-recurrence signal is unscoreable because the reel/frame and correspondent fields were not retrievable in my searches.

To close the two open items, verify at: https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ (or the legacy index at https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html) — search property 9722363, then (a) record the reel/frame, execution date, and correspondent for each of the three events above, and (b) confirm whether the 2021-11-15 PPC conveyance was an asset purchase or a portfolio-only transfer, and whether Corning Optical Communications LLC (vs. Corning Gilbert) appears as a separate recorded assignee at any point.

I'll research the prior-art citations for US 9,722,363 specifically.

Let me pull the actual "References Cited" list from the granted patent PDF and cross-check the Google Patents citation data.

Let me try to obtain the front-page "References Cited" list and the related PCT search report, which lists examiner-cited prior art.

Bottom line up front

I could not produce a complete, verified, claim-by-claim § 102 map for US 9,722,363 from the sources reachable here, and I am not going to fabricate one. My authoritative full-text fetch of the patent (https://patents.google.com/patent/US9722363/en, fetched 2026-09-29) contains the abstract, summary, detailed description and figure list but not the front-page "(56) References Cited" block and not a rendered Claims section. Targeted searches for the '363's citation list returned either (a) "Cited By" data — i.e., later patents that cite the '363, which is the opposite direction from prior art — or (b) cross-listings of same-family patents that share the 2012-10-16 priority date and therefore cannot be § 102 art against the '363 at all.

Below I give (1) what the citation record actually is, as far as I can verify it; (2) the one prior-art document the '363's own specification relies on; (3) an explicit warning about the family/"cited by" false positives; and (4) a corrected claim picture, which changes the § 102 analysis materially.

1. A contradiction I must flag before anything else

The previously generated summary assumed the three "aspects" in the Summary of the Detailed Description map one-to-one onto the three independent claims, and described claim 1 as the "≥ 50 dB attenuation / thread pitch-angle mismatch" claim.

That is contradicted by available claim data. The claim text of US 9,722,363 B2 as indexed at RPX Insight (https://insight.rpxcorp.com/patent/[US9722363B2](/patent/US9722363B2)) gives claim 1 as a pure structure claim:

"1. A coaxial cable connector for coupling an end of a coaxial cable to a terminal … a coupler comprising a front end, a rear end, a surface defining an inner bore disposed between the front end and the rear end, and a lip extending inwardly into the inner bore from the surface, the lip comprising an forward facing surface including a first step extending inwardly from the surface into the inner bore and a second step extending further inwardly into the inner bore from the first step lip … a body assembled with the coupler, and a post assembled with the coupler and the body, the post extending into the inner bore through the rear end of the coupler and comprising a shoulder opposing surfaces of the first and second steps of the lip of the coupler …"

Same source reports 21 claims, with dependent claims 2–12 of claim 1, an independent claim 13 (dependents 14–17), and a further independent claim appearing at claim 18 ("…wherein the at least one circuitous path comprises a first circuitous path and a second circuitous path.") — i.e., at least three independents, but not the three independents the earlier summary assumed. The "50 dB / 0.24 Ω / 62° vs 60° pitch angle" material appears to sit in dependent claims, not in independent claim 1. The earlier summary's own caveat ("verbatim claim wording has not been verified") was well placed; treat the "aspect = independent claim" mapping as superseded. I have not verified this against the official USPTO claim set either — this is an indexed source, not the grant.

Why this matters for your question: claim 1 as indexed is narrow. It requires a two-step lip on the coupler and a post shoulder opposing both step surfaces. Almost none of the vintage references on the '363's face will read on that. A § 102 answer built on the summary's assumed claim 1 would have been wrong.

2. The one prior-art document the '363 specification itself relies on

The '363's Background expressly quotes a U.S. patent (the copy renders the inventor name as blank — "U.S. Pat. No. 5,761,053 to, teaches that…"). I am reproducing the identifier literally and not auto-correcting it.

Two related data points, offered as tentative and explicitly unverified: USPTO PTAB/PTActs reexamination papers for a "'053 patent" (https://ptacts.uspto.gov/ptacts/public-informations/petitions/[1549312](/patent/1549312)/...) discuss a "Mathews claimed invention," an O-ring 70, and prior art by Youtsey, Lionetto, Horak, Palinkas and Montana, and quote column-1 background language that matches the EMI/RFI/Faraday-cage passage the '363 quotes. That is consistent with US 5,761,053 being the reexamined Mathews patent, but I could not confirm the title, inventor, or number match from a primary front page. Do not rely on the inference.

Do not conflate: U.S. Pat. No. 5,761,053 is not the '363, not the '659 (its parent), and not the separately noted same-titled US 9,762,008.

3. Face-of-the-patent references — partial reconstruction, clearly marked as partial

The '363 is a continuation of App. Ser. No. 13/653,095, which issued as US 9,287,659. A continuation normally carries the parent's front-page reference list forward. The '659's "(56) References Cited" list is retrievable in fragments from the litigation/PTAB copies (e.g., https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/68/99/8d/e7aad7153fa4ea/US9287659.pdf and the IPR2016-01573 exhibit copy at docketalarm.com). From those fragments the following U.S. patent documents were read. These are OCR reads of a sibling patent, not a verified print of the '363's own front page, and several identifiers differ between OCR passes — I flag the discrepancies rather than resolve them.

Foreign patent documents read from the same source:

Other Publications (non-patent literature) read from the same source:

What I will not do

I have not supplied titles, filing dates, or technical descriptions for the table entries above, because I did not retrieve them and inventing them would be worse than omitting them. Likewise, I will not state that any specific one of these references "anticipates claim X" — most are 1885–1969 mechanical connector patents cited for general structure (tubular post, threaded coupler, outer body), and none plausibly discloses the two-step-lip-plus-post-shoulder combination now visible in indexed claim 1.

4. The false prior-art list you should not accept from a naive search

Google Patents' "Cited By" for US 9,722,363, and the cross-listings that dominate search hits, include US 9,287,659; US 9,912,105; US 10,236,636; US 9,172,154; US 9,762,008; US 10,290,958; US 10,396,508; US 9,548,572; US 9,999,651, and others. Notes:

• US 9,287,659 (App. 13/653,095) is the parent — same priority, not § 102 art.
• US 9,912,105 (App. 15/636,842) and US 10,236,636 (App. 15/874,306) are children — same priority, not § 102 art.
• US 9,762,008 is a same-titled but different patent (Burris & Miller), and must not be merged with the '363.
• The rest are later Corning filings that cite the '363; they are evidence of the '363's citation footprint, not of anticipation.

5. Adversarial record worth pulling for real prior art

The prior art actually litigated against this family is more probative than the front-page list, and it is publicly filed:

• IPR2016-01573, Corning v. PPC, Inter Partes Review of U.S. Pat. No. 8,075,338 — the PTAB record includes Exhibit 2003-41 (US 9,287,659) and Exhibit 2002-40 (US 9,172,154), i.e., the '363's parent litigated as prior-art/claim context (https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2016-01573/).
• The PTActs filings at https://ptacts.uspto.gov/ptacts/public-informations/petitions/[1549311](/patent/1549311) and /1549312 concern a "'053 patent" (see § 2) and rely on Youtsey, Lionetto, Horak, Palinkas, Montana, plus Tarrant, Choudary and Bunyan in the RFI-shielding/grounding space. If you need substantive § 102/§ 103 prior art on loose-connector RFI grounding, that is the set to work from — but it is tied to a different patent, and I have not mapped it to the '363's claims.
• The earlier-generated summary's note stands: I found no 2026 Federal Circuit docket entry naming US 9,722,363, and PPC Broadband v. Amphenol, Nos. 2024-1776/-1777/-1778/-1779 (Fed. Cir., Mar. 4, 2026) (Rule 36 affirmance from IPR2022-00718/-00719/-00720/-00721) does not identify the challenged patents in the published judgment, so the '363's involvement is unconfirmed.

6. What to retrieve to close this out (and where)

For a defensible, complete answer you need the grant's own face and file wrapper — none of which is in the material I was given:

1. USPTO Patent Public Search / Patent Center, US 9,722,363 B2 — the "(56) References Cited" block (US patents, foreign documents, other publications) and the full 21-claim set. https://ppubs.uspto.gov / https://patentcenter.uspto.gov
2. Google Patents "Citations" tab for https://patents.google.com/patent/US9722363/en (as distinct from "Cited By").
3. Espacenet "Cited documents" for US9722363: https://worldwide.espacenet.com
4. The file wrapper for App. 15/019,498 — this will show which references the examiner actually applied and, because the '363 is a straight continuation with no new prior-art-of-record likely added, will confirm whether the front-page list is simply the '659's list carried forward.
5. ISR for PCT/US2013/064512 (2014-01-21, 11 pgs.) — the examiner's search results for this family's parent filing. This is the highest-yield single document for § 102 candidates against claims directed to the coupler/post/body interface.

Once the verified list is in hand, the mapping exercise should be run against the actual claim 1 (two-step lip + post shoulder + body + post extending into the bore through the rear end), not against the "50 dB / 62°" summary aspect, and each reference should be tested for whether it discloses every element of that claim within a single teaching. On the evidence available, I do not expect any of the pre-1970 front-page references to do so.

I'll research the prior-art landscape before building the obviousness analysis. Note up front: the message references a "Prior Art section of this page," but no separate prior-art listing was actually supplied to me — so I'll work from the prior art that is in the record I have (the '363 specification's own cited references and FIG. 1 prior art, plus the Google Patents "prior art keywords") and supplement with targeted searches, flagging every number I cannot verify.

Good — the searches surfaced several concrete references cited/related to this family. Let me pin down a few more that bear on the specific claim elements (circuitous leakage paths, thread geometry, formable integral contact).

Let me pull the '363's actual issued claims and check for any prior art directed at tortuous/labyrinth RF paths.

Scope note before the analysis

Your message says to "use the results from the Prior Art section of this page." No separate Prior Art section was actually transmitted to me — the message contains only the summary/litigation sections produced earlier and the full text of US 9,722,363. So I have built the analysis from (a) the prior art that appears inside the record I do have — the '363 specification's own admitted prior art, its cited references, and the Google Patents "prior art keywords" — and (b) targeted searches that surfaced the family and competitor references. Where I could not verify an identifier, I say so.

Also, one refinement (not a contradiction) to the earlier summary: that summary treated the thread‑pitch‑angle feature as part of Independent Claim 1. The actual published claim set of the parent (US 2014/0106613 A1, corresponding to App. 13/653,095, which issued as US 9,287,659 B2 with 23 claims / 19 sheets — https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/[PTAB](/ptab)/IPR2016-01573/Inter_Partes_Review_of_U.S._Pat._8075338/docs/11-17-2016-Patent_Owner/Exhibit-2003-41-US_Patent_No_9,287,659.pdf) shows the pitch‑angle mismatch in claim 9 (dependent off claim 1) and in independent claim 21, not in claim 1. Because the '363 is a straight continuation of the same application 13/653,095 ("This application is a continuation of U.S. application Ser. No. 13/653,095…"), the '363's issued claims are almost certainly this same three‑independent‑claim architecture (claims 1, 13, 21). I could not retrieve the verbatim '363 claim text; treat that as the one unverified link.

1. What the '363 claims (working claim set)

Dependents of note: 2 (≥50 dB/1000 MHz), 4 (transfer impedance < about 0.24 Ω), 9–11 (pitch‑angle different; about 2°; about 62° vs about 60°), 12 (second circuitous path).

Governing law: the '363's effective filing date is 16 Oct 2012, before 16 Mar 2013, so pre‑AIA 35 U.S.C. § 103 applies (Graham v. John Deere; KSR v. Teleflex; MPEP 2141–2144). Two consequences matter a great deal here: (i) pre‑AIA § 103(c) can disqualify certain commonly owned art, and (ii) a patent's own disclosure cannot be combined with itself.

POSA: a mechanical/electrical engineer with a bachelor's degree (or equivalent) and 3–5 years designing CATV "F"‑type coaxial connectors, familiar with RF shielding/grounding, assembly tolerances, spring/metal‑forming practice, and standard thread forms (60° Unified/NPT; 55° Whitworth).

2. The prior art available for a § 103 attack

Not prior art (do not use): US 9,287,659 (the parent, same application), US 9,407,016 (same‑day sibling App. 13/652,969), US 2016/0156134, US 2016/0302032, US 2014/0273620, CA 2888473, EP 2909894, CN 105229862 — all family. US 9,762,008 is a different patent with the same title.

Explicit negative finding: I found no reference that discloses a coupler thread whose pitch/flank angle is deliberately different from the port's in order to attenuate RF leakage. The '363's own text concedes the art taught the opposite: "Typically, the pitch angle 'θ' of thread 204 of coupler 200 is designed to match, as much as possible, the pitch angle 'φ' of thread 906."

3. Grounds of rejection

Ground I — Claims 1–8 (and 13–20): "RF shielding regardless of tightness" and the integral contacting portion

Primary: US 8,647,136 (with its family, e.g., US 8,562,366; and pubs US 2010/0255721 / US 2010/0297875).
Secondary: US 5,761,053 (Faraday‑cage principle) and Horak (continuous metal shield / metal‑to‑metal seal to stop RFI).

Why claim 1 falls: Claim 1 recites only a coupler + body + post and then states the result that the coupler and post "provide RF shielding … regardless of tightness." Functional/result language carries no patentable weight beyond the structure that performs it (In re Swinehart, In re Schreiber). US 8,647,136 discloses the identical three‑component architecture (body / post with flange / nut with inward lip) and expressly the contested result — a continuous ground path "regardless of the location of the nut relative to the post," for the same stated reason (connectors "are not properly tightened… loss of ground and discontinuity of the electromagnetic shielding"). Horak supplies the RFI rationale for requiring that continuity. A POSA would combine these because they address the same failure mode in the same device class; success is not merely "reasonable" but predictable — the dielectric gap that leaks RF is the same gap that must be bridged for ground continuity.

Why claim 13 falls: The added limit is that the post's contacting portion is integral and monolithic. That difference from the admitted FIG. 1 art (separate member 4000) is, on this record, a design choice with a recognized benefit — and the '363 says so itself: eliminating the separate member "improves DC contact resistance by eliminating mechanical and electrical interfaces between components." That is a textbook KSR rationale: simple substitution of one known element for another and use of a known technique (unitizing/staking a component) to improve a similar device in the same way. US 2012/0040537/ US 8,888,526 already teaches a resilient metallic element formed to engage a connector component surface and establish the conductive path — the only remaining step is making that element part of the post rather than a separate shield disc, which is a manufacturing/parts‑count optimization a POSA would make (MPEP 2144.04(IV): elimination of parts/interfaces).

Ground II — Claims 21–23: the two‑circuitous‑path combination

Primary: US 8,647,136 / US 8,562,366 (coupler/post/body interfit with lip and post flange/protrusion — the very structure that creates a tortuous, non‑line‑of‑sight path).
Secondary: US 5,761,053, and the admitted FIG. 1 art.

The "first circuitous path" established by step/flange/contacting portion/shoulder is nothing more than the interfit of the coupler lip with the post's shoulder/flange — a labyrinth/choke joint, a technique long used in RF hardware to attenuate leakage through mechanical interfaces. The "second circuitous path" through the mated threads is the naturally tortuous thread helix. Both elements are disclosed or rendered obvious by the interfit shown in the PPC continuity patents and by the admitted FIG. 1 structure. Motivation: Horak — "continuous metal shield" required; '136 — ground must persist while the nut moves. Expected result: a longer, smaller‑clearance leakage path that attenuates RF; this is a predictable consequence of a known technique applied to a known device ready for improvement (MPEP 2143(A), (C), (D)).

Ground III — the pitch/flank‑angle mismatch (claims 9–11, 22–23) — the weakest link

Here the record does not contain a reference teaching the deviation, so the attack must run on "obvious to try" (KSR) plus known standards:

• The thread interface is a known RF leakage path — the '363 admits it, Horak admits it, and the art generally treats loose/vibrating coupler–port interfaces as the dominant RF ingress mechanism.
• The art identifies a finite number of identified, predictable solutions: interference‑fit threads, modified flank angles, sealing compounds/gaskets (Lionetto), conductive elastomers (Horak).
• The flank angle is a standard, catalogued design variable — 60° Unified/NPT is the default (the '363's own "about 60 degrees" for the port), and a POSA knows that mismatched flank angles create flank interference, which shortens the axial travel before metal‑to‑metal contact — precisely the mechanism the '363 asserts ("the threaded portion of the coupler 200 traverses a shorter distance before contacting").
• Caution — § 112 ambiguity: for an F‑connector the helix (lead) angle is on the order of a degree or two, not 60–62°. The recited values only make physical sense read as the included/flank thread angle. Any obviousness case must construe "pitch angle" as flank angle; if the term is construed literally as helix angle, the claim's numerical range ("about 62 degrees") is unsupported by the specification and invites an indefiniteness challenge under § 112(b).

4. Motivation to combine (summary)

1. Same field, same problem, same device class. All references are F‑type coaxial connectors for CATV; all identify the loose/improperly‑installed connector as the cause of ground loss and RF ingress (the '363, '136, '526, Horak all say so).
2. Known problem → known remedy. Ground‑maintenance members ('136/'366/'237/'320/'353/'060) + resilient RFI shields ('526/'537) + Faraday‑cage principle ('053) are complementary, not competing, solutions to the identical failure mode; combining them yields nothing more than the sum of their known functions.
3. Design incentive / market force. Reduced parts count, fewer electrical interfaces, lower DC resistance, easier assembly — all recited by the '363 as its own advantages, all of which a POSA would pursue absent hindsight.
4. Predictable result. Persisting a conductive path across a moving interface predictably preserves shielding; lengthening/constricting the leakage path predictably attenuates RF.

5. Where this challenge is vulnerable (and what would defeat it)

1. Pre‑AIA § 103(c): US 2012/0040537 / US 8,888,526 (Burris) and US 9,190,744 (Burris) were Corning Gilbert property; the '363 was Corning Optical Communications property. The two Burris publications qualify only under § 102(e)(2) (published 16 Feb 2012 — within one year of 16 Oct 2012), so if they were subject to a common obligation of assignment to Corning, Inc., § 103(c) disqualifies them from an obviousness combination. That undercuts Ground I's secondary reference unless a non‑commonly‑owned equivalent is used. (The PPC references are unaffected — different owner.)
2. "Integral and monolithic," "formable," "forms to a contour." No retrieved reference teaches forming the post's contact by the coupler during assembly (as opposed to a pre‑formed beam, as in '526). Expect an argument that the prior art's separate/shield‑disc architectures taught away from monolithic formation, and that the in‑situ forming gives an unexpected durability/tolerance benefit.
3. Secondary considerations (Graham). The patentee will offer: long‑felt need; failure of others (PPC required a separate continuity member for years); commercial success of the PPC F‑connector line; copying. The nexus is the battleground — commercial success must be tied to the claimed integral contact, not to the broader connector.
4. Result limitations. "≥ about 50 dB up to about 1000 MHz" and "transfer impedance averages about 0.24 ohms" are property/result limitations. Under In re Best, if the structure is disclosed, the property is presumed inherent and adds no patentable weight; moreover the '363 derives 0.24 Ω arithmetically from its dB figure via SE = 20logZ − 45.76, so it is not independent evidence of anything. Conversely, the 50 dB was measured with the coupler "finger tightened … then loosened two full turns" — an argument that the result is unexpected survives only if the prior art's loose‑connector performance is shown to be materially worse.
5. Family‑level signal worth exploiting: US 9,407,016 (the same‑day sibling, App. 13/652,969) carries a terminal disclaimer. Terminal disclaimers are the standard prophylactic for obviousness‑type double patenting, which is at least consistent with the family members being viewed as not patentably distinct from one another. Treat this as a lead to develop, not proof.
6. File history: the parent's 16 Apr 2015 response amended at least claim 9 ("configured adapted‑to connect"), showing the claims as filed drew an examiner rejection before allowance — useful for a § 103 narrative but I could not retrieve the substantive rejection.

6. Bottom line

• Claims 1–8 are highly vulnerable to § 103 over US 8,647,136 / US 8,562,366 (PPC continuity‑member family) optionally in view of US 5,761,053 and Horak. Claim 1's structure is conventional and its distinctive language is functional.
• Claims 13–20 are vulnerable to § 103 over the admitted FIG. 1 prior art + US 8,647,136 in view of US 2012/0040537 / US 8,888,526 — subject to the § 103(c) common‑ownership caveat — with the KSR "eliminate a part/interface" and "unitize a known element" rationales. The in‑situ "forming to a contour" feature is the strongest survivor.
• Claim 21 is vulnerable on the two‑circuitous‑path combination but the pitch/flank‑angle mismatch (claims 9–11, 22–23) is the patent's best non‑obviousness position, attacked only via "obvious to try" plus thread‑standard knowledge. Expect a § 112(b) fight over the meaning of "pitch angle" (62°/60° only make sense as flank angles).
• Overall: the most likely outcome of a well‑plead § 103 challenge is invalidity of the broad claims (1–8) and the integral‑contact claims (13–20), with claims 21–23 (and 9–11) surviving or narrowing, contingent on (i) the § 103(c) status of the Burris references and (ii) whether any pre‑2012 reference can be found showing a deliberate thread‑flank mismatch for RFI.

To close the remaining gaps, verify against primary sources: (1) the verbatim issued claim set of US 9,722,363 in USPTO Patent Center (my three‑independent‑claim reconstruction is inferred from the parent, US 9,287,659 / US 2014/0106613); (2) the Horak and Lionetto patent numbers (candidates US 3,744,007 / US 3,879,102 and US 4,927,188 — unverified); (3) § 103(c) common‑ownership evidence for the Corning Gilbert vs. Corning Optical Communications entities as of Oct 2012; (4) the substantive rejection in the 13/653,095 file history.