Stephanie Martz, general counsel of the National Retail Federation, said the court’s ruling was “a major step toward stopping patent trolls and their attempts to commit extortion against retailers and other businesses that have done nothing wrong.”

“Making it clear that many cases can and should be resolved by fixing patents at the patent office rather than rushing to court to sue for infringement makes it much easier for our members to fight patent trolls,” Ms. Martz said in a statement.

But Adam Mossoff, a law professor at George Mason University, said in a statement that the Supreme Court had taken a wrong turn.

The decision, he said, “destabilizes the foundation that patents provide to the U.S. innovation economy, as stable and effective property rights are the necessary platform from which inventors, venture capitalists and companies create the new products and services that have made life a modern miracle.”

The case grew out of a dispute involving Oil States Energy Services, which owned a patent for protecting wellhead equipment during hydraulic fracturing while drilling for oil. A competitor, Greene’s Energy Group, successfully challenged the patent under the procedure, called “inter partes” review, which is Latin for “between the parties.”