Posts in IPWatchdog Articles

As you will read in Part 1 of the interview (see below) Dickinson was not only the first Director of the USPTO, but he was the last Commissioner. The American Inventors Protection Act shuffled the titles around for seemingly unknown reasons, and since the AIPA went into effect while Dickinson was at the helm of the USPTO he is guaranteed a place in patent history, or at least patent trivia. In Part 1, I also asked him about how he managed to bring down average pendency during his tenure, which was the only time over the last 20+ years that has happened. We also discussed how he managed to get on the short list for the Director/Commissioner job, the confirmation process, the craziest question he received during confirmation, vanishing IP boutiques and RCEs. Part 2 is largely devoted to patent reform, which will be extremely interesting, I promise!

Putting aside my disdain for the Supreme Court stepping into patent matters of any kind, what does seem clear is that the Supreme Court wants to pretend that patents are the same as any other area of law and the same processes and procedures pertaining to other areas of law apply equally to the patent world. See eBay v. MercExchange and Zurko v. Dickinson for but two examples. The Supreme Court also loves case by case approaches without hard and fast rules that can actually be objectively and even-handedly applied. See KSR v. Teleflex and Bilski v. Kappos for but two examples. So strictly adhering to this clear trend it would suggest that the Supreme Court would be quite open to giving district court judges broad latitude to enforce their own Orders when appropriate. This would allow the district courts discretion to handle different cases differently, so that would cover the case by case approach, and it would seem to be in keeping with theories of judicial economy, which are typically left to the district court to handle, particularly when procedure, process and management of the docket are at issue.

I am skeptical about the prospects for invalidating patents on drugs, particularly important or blockbuster drugs. I also question whether anti-patent do-gooders in the biotech and pharma space are really causing more harm than good through attempts to bust patents on blockbuster drugs. According to their own press release, PUBPAT acknowledges that the tablet is heat stable and does not need to be refrigerated like prior versions of the drug. They seemingly make the argument, although not directly, that because this makes it much more convenient for patients it is unfair to charge prices sufficient to recoup R&D and a premium to make the speculative R&D reasonably profitable for investors. Of course, the fact that the drug in question is extremely convenient for patients is not a reason to invalid the claims, and in fact is likely a compelling reason why in this instance the patent claims cover a truly novel and nonobvious innovation.

I don’t know why Microsoft didn’t present all the prior art in the Texas case sooner, and I can’t explain why they might have wanted to wait until after asking the Supreme Court to take the appeal before filing the most recent reexamination request. One thing is for certain though: Microsoft would be in a much better position at this point if it had filed the request a year ago. Had they filed the request sooner they might already be at advisory action stage now, which could have provided a stronger case for refusing to enjoin the defendant as was the case in Flexiteek Americas.

I continually preach to inventors the need to follow what I call a “business responsible” approach, which is really just my way of counseling inventors to remember that the goal is to not only invent but to hopefully make some money. Truthfully, the goal is to make more money than what has been invested, which is how the United States Congress defined “success” in the American Inventors Protection Act of 1999. Odds of being successful with one of your inventions increase dramatically if you engage in some simple steps to ensure you are not investing time and money on an invention that has little promise.

The United States Patent and Trademark Office has provided an update to its Examination Guidelines concerning the law of obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 in light of precedential decisions from the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit issued since the 2007 decision by the United States Supreme Court in KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex Inc. The Updated Guidelines were published today in the Federal Register, and in response to the requests of many stakeholders the USPTO has included additional examples to help elucidate the ever-evolving law of obviousness. These guidelines are intended primarily to be used by Office personnel in conjunction with the guidance in the Manual of Patent Examining Procedure. The effective date of the these new Guidelines is September 1, 2010, but members of the public are invited to provide comments on the 2010 KSR Guidelines Update. The Office is especially interested in receiving suggestions of recent decisional law in the field of obviousness that would have particular value as teaching tools.

After you savor that wonderful “Moment of Discovery” and you have finished daydreaming about striking it rich, you really do need to move forward to take a cold hard honest look at your new product. At this point you don’t have to go into excruciating detail, just a quick overview to make sure it is worth pursuing. The questions generated will form the basis of your development process. A full Proof of Concept Analysis consists of three equally important parts: Business Analysis, Ownership Analysis and Product Analysis. Let’s take a look at each part individually.

As explained by the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development in a draft report draft report: “The overall degree to which products are being counterfeited and pirated is unknown and there do not appear to be any methodologies which could be employed to develop an acceptable overall estimate.” The OECD draft report goes on to explain that based on best estimates that international trade in counterfeit and pirated goods could well have accounted for up to US$ 200 billion in 2005, but that figure does not tell the entire story. This $200 billion figure does not include counterfeit and pirated products that are produced and consumed domestically, nor does it include the significant volume of pirated digital products distributed via the Internet.

On Friday, August 27, 2010, Interval Research Corporation brought a patent infringement lawsuit against a who’s who of tech companies in the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington at Seattle, specifically suing AOL, Inc., Apple, Inc., eBay, Inc., Facebook, Inc., Google Inc., Netflix, Inc., Office Depot, Inc., OfficeMax Inc., Staples, Inc., Yahoo! Inc. and YouTube, LLC.…

How often have you felt you had a great invention that was just what the world was waiting for. Unfortunately, many would-be entrepreneurs are under the illusion that that is all they need for someone to beat a path to their doorstep, big check in hand. If only it were that easy! The average entrepreneur usually does not think about what is really necessary to make their invention a commercial success. As a result, their great ideas often fizzle before they ever have a chance to get to the marketplace.

I understand the objections to embryonic stem cell research, but I simply cannot understand anyone that has a moral objection to embryonic stem cell research. How is it moral to watch those with crippling diseases agonize without trying to do everything we possibly can to find cures and treatments? Simply put, there is nothing moral about watching the suffering of another human being and doing nothing.

You have probably had circumstances when you have positively associated with a certain trademark.  Perhaps you were traveling and had the option to eat at one of several restaurants.  You might have preferred a sit-down meal, but you might have opted for McDonald’s or Burger King instead because you are familiar with what you will get, know it is going…

Put simply, Section 337 requires that an ITC complainant show that, as of the time of filing, (a) it maintains a certain level of economic activity within the United States in connection with the asserted intellectual property right, and (b) this economic activity is devoted to exploiting the intellectual property right at issue (in the case of a patent, at least one claim of the asserted patent). Alternatively, the complainant may show that a domestic industry “is in the process of being established.” This standing requirement is called the “domestic industry requirement,” and the two sub-requirements listed above are called respectively the “economic prong” and the “technical prong” of the domestic industry requirement. “Domestic industry” is a term of art that refers to the entity or entities exploiting the asserted intellectual property in the United States – the rights holder, plus its licensees, if any.

The Commerce Department’s United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and the Federal Service for Intellectual Property, Patents and Trademarks of the Russian Federation (ROSPATENT) have agreed to partner in establishing a Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) pilot program.

The Federal Trade Commission and Department of Justice on Friday, August 19, 2010, issued revised Horizontal Merger Guidelines that outline how the federal antitrust agencies evaluate the likely competitive impact of mergers and whether those mergers comply with U.S. antitrust law. These changes to the Guidelines mark the first major revision of the merger guidelines in 18 years, and is…