The passage of the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act established the inter partes review and post-grant review processes before the United States Patent and Trademark Office. As IPR and PGR proceedings have evolved, the role of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office director has grown in importance. Of the four USPTO directors who have served since the new grant proceedings were established, Director Kathi Vidal has had the largest impact on these proceedings through issuance of precedential opinions, policy pronouncements and the recent advanced notice of proposed rulemakings. Intellectual Property Litigation partners Amadou Diaw and Linnea Cipriano, and former associate Shweta Kumar explain more in Law360.