On October 5, 2026, the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) of the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) issued a final inter partes review decision on US10,569,466, a Stratasys patent titled “Tagged Build Material for Three-Dimensional Printing,” challenged by Shenzhen Bambu Lab Technology Co., Ltd. Claims 1–5, 7–13 and 16–20 were all declared unpatentable. These were the claims Bambu Lab had challenged, marking another successful challenge to a Stratasys patent.
This was the last patent to receive a decision among the 14 Stratasys patents Bambu Lab challenged before the patent offices in the United States and China. In China, Bambu Lab successfully challenged five Stratasys patents, all of which were declared invalid by the China National Intellectual Property Administration between April and September this year.
In the United States, Stratasys brought two patent lawsuits against Bambu Lab, dividing ten patents into two groups. Bambu Lab challenged nine of them, with decisions arriving from June onward. The USPTO declined to institute review for two patents. Of the remaining seven that reached final decisions, Bambu Lab won complete victories on five, with every challenged claim declared unpatentable. For two other patents, identified as numbers 3 and 6 in the source's discussion, some claims were invalidated while the remaining claims were upheld.
Last month, a US jury ruled in one of the cases that Bambu Lab had willfully infringed patents and awarded $27.6 million in damages based on four patents. Bambu Lab issued an official statement disagreeing with the verdict and continued its appeal.
After that verdict, the USPTO issued decisions on September 28–29 on three further Stratasys patents challenged by Bambu Lab. Two were connected with the $27.6 million award and accounted for $2.8 million in damages. Bambu Lab may therefore seek a change to the earlier court judgment based on the patent office's decisions.
Overall, achieving these results was difficult as the USPTO has tightened its approach to patent validity challenges over the past two years. Although the jury awarded more than $20 million based on two patents that remained valid, Bambu Lab's challenges substantially reduced its exposure. Three patents in the other pending lawsuit have also been found invalid.
The case provides an example for other Chinese companies facing US patent infringement litigation. An active response can reveal weaknesses in asserted patents that may lead to their invalidation. Challenging patent validity is therefore an important defensive strategy for Chinese companies facing patent disputes in the United States.
Source: Patent Horizon.
Original source article
AI-translated from an article by Kuaixiong on Nanjixiong, originally published on 2026-10-08. Text and images retain the original source attribution.
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