The Cybor standard for reviewing patent claim construction on appeal was the law of the land for nearly 20 years. Many had tried to topple the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit’s 1998 decision in Cybor Corp. v. FAS Technologies Inc. and failed.

Even as Goodwin Procter was petitioning the U.S. Supreme Court for certiorari, the Federal Circuit doubled down — upholding Cybor en banc on the grounds of stare decisis.