Interference No. 103,345
In the interest of completeness, we have also
considered whether, if Staples had succeeded in proving he was
the first to conceive and the first to reduce to practice,
Roberge nevertheless would have been entitled to judgment on
the ground that Staples abandoned, suppressed, or concealed
the invention after achieving actual reductions to practice by
constructing the first and second models in January 1980 and
February 1990. The answer is no, because a holding of
abandonment, suppression, or concealment would not bar Staples
from relying on the date of the actual reduction to practice
date as his conception date. See Paulik v. Rizkalla, 796 F.2d
at 460, 230 USPQ at 437:
[B]ecause of Paulik's long delay in filing his
application, he could not rely upon the date of his
actual reduction to practice as establishing
priority as of the date of that reduction to
practice. Paulik, however, still may rely upon the
fact that he had reduced his invention to practice
four years before Rizkalla filed, for example, as
evidence of possession of the completed invention.
See also Connin v. Andrews, 223 USPQ 243, 250 (Bd. Pat. Int.
1984) ("the de facto first inventor who suppresses or conceals
forfeits only the right to rely on his prior actual reduction
to practice and does not forfeit his right to rely on his
prior conception"). Furthermore, even assuming a holding of
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