United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ______________________

MEDTRONIC, INC., MEDTRONIC VASCULAR, INC., Appellants

v.

TELEFLEX INNOVATIONS S.A.R.L., Appellee ______________________

2021-2359, 2021-2362, 2021-2366 ______________________

Appeals from the United States Patent and Trademark Office, Patent Trial and Appeal Board in Nos. IPR2020- 00129, IPR2020-00134, IPR2020-00138. ______________________

Decided: June 5, 2023 ______________________

JENNIFER L. GRABER, Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP, Washington, DC, argued for appellants. Also represented by BRITTANY BLUEITT AMADI; TASHA JOY BAHAL, MARK CHRISTOPHER FLEMING, HANNAH ELISE GELBORT, MADELEINE C. LAUPHEIMER, Boston, MA.

JOSEPH W. WINKELS, Carlson, Caspers, Vandenburgh & Lindquist PA, Minneapolis, MN, argued for appellee. Also represented by PETER M. KOHLHEPP, TARA CATHERINE NORGARD, J. DEREK VANDENBURGH. ______________________ Case: 21-2359 Document: 59 Page: 2 Filed: 06/05/2023

2 MEDTRONIC, INC. v. TELEFLEX INNOVATIONS S.A.R.L.

Before MOORE, Chief Judge, LOURIE and DYK, Circuit Judges. MOORE, Chief Judge. Medtronic, Inc. and Medtronic Vascular, Inc. (collec- tively, Medtronic) appeal inter partes review decisions of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board holding Medtronic failed to establish the unpatentability of various claims of U.S. Patent Nos. RE45,380; RE45,760; and RE47,379 (the patents-in-suit). Medtronic also appeals the Board’s deci- sions granting Teleflex Innovation S.à.r.l’s (Teleflex) mo- tion to amend certain claims of the ’379 patent. For the following reasons, we affirm. BACKGROUND Coronary artery disease, in which plaque buildup nar- rows the lumen (i.e., the tubular cavity) of a patient’s ar- tery and obstructs blood flow, affects millions of Americans. Cardiologists refer to this narrowing of a patient’s artery as stenosis. See ’380 patent at 1:48–49. 1 For decades, car- diologists have used devices known as guide catheters to deliver interventional cardiology devices (e.g., guidewires, stents, balloon catheters) designed to alleviate stenoses. Id. at 1:39–52. Treatment typically involves inserting the guide catheter into the patient’s femoral or radial artery and guiding the catheter to the patient’s aorta until the dis- tal tip of the catheter reaches the ostium (i.e., opening) of the coronary artery. Id. at 1:53–59. Interventional devices can then be inserted into the proximal opening of the cath- eter, advanced through the lumen of the catheter using a

1 The patents-in-suit share a common specification. For simplicity, all citations to the written description will refer to the ’380 patent. Case: 21-2359 Document: 59 Page: 3 Filed: 06/05/2023

MEDTRONIC, INC. v. TELEFLEX INNOVATIONS S.A.R.L. 3

guidewire, and delivered past the stenosis. 2 Id. These procedures involved certain challenges and risks. For example, “[c]rossing tough lesions can create enough backward force to dislodge the guide catheter from the ostium of the artery being treated,” disrupting the pro- cedure and potentially harming the patient. Id. at 1:59– 63, 4:56–62. This problem drove practitioners to seek new catheter designs and methods with increased “back-up sup- port” that would prevent backward dislodgment of the catheter. Id. at 1:59–67. For example, one method dis- closed in a prior art journal article (Takahashi) involves a “mother-and-child” technique in which a standard 5 French guide catheter is inserted into a 6 French guide catheter and advanced until its distal tip is deep within the patient’s ostium, a techniq