On October 22, 2026, USIJ filed an amicus brief in Centripetal Networks, LLC v. Cisco Systems, Inc. urging the Supreme Court to grant certiorari and reverse a Federal Circuit decision that erased a judgment of more than $2 billion against Cisco for willful infringement of Centripetal’s cybersecurity patents. After the original trial judge was disqualified, a successor judge adopted new claim constructions once the record had closed and overturned the infringement findings. USIJ contends this procedure deprived Centripetal of due process and signals to startups and their investors that U.S. patents offer little protection against copying by dominant incumbents, further eroding investment in patent-intensive technologies.
“For the Federal Circuit to allow the new judge to ‘move the property line’ after the record was closed cannot be called an objective application of the rule of law.”