Posts in International

Skynet. HAL 9000. The Matrix. The Joshua Computer from WarGames. It’s not hard to look around popular culture and find examples of artificial intelligence (AI) stirring a span of doomsday fears stemming from either a lack of understanding of AI’s dangers to the actual targeting of humans by AI weapons. The names of Elon Musk, Steve Wozniak and Stephen Hawking, along with several faculty members from academic institutions like Oxford and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, are among hundreds of signatures found attached to an open letter published by the Future of Life Institute which calls for “concrete research directions” to pursue for ensuring that AI remains a social benefit.

The controversy swirling around the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Trade Agreement sheds light on two critically important but divisive issues: international trade and intellectual property protection for pharmaceuticals. One of the most significant sticking points in the negotiations is the issue of intellectual property protection for pharmaceuticals, specifically data exclusivity. Data exclusivity is a means of correcting a free-riding market failure, providing the innovative firms with a limited period of time in which data from clinical trials and other required testing cannot be used by competing firms to secure market access.

In 2012, the global robotics industry saw a total of $26.8 billion in economic activity, according to Bloomberg Business. Much of this was focused in the field of heavy industrial robotics, as was pointed out in a video segment produced by the business news publisher, but robotics for consumers are expected to become a much larger sector in the next…

A lot of research and development into alternative fuels for aircraft has focused on biofuels, which has also been an area of focus of automakers. Last January, Boeing Co. (NYSE:BA) announced a series of developments in creating green diesel that cuts carbon dioxide emissions in half compared to conventional fossil fuels. The company also unveiled a breakthrough in the effective biofuel conversion of halophytes, shrub like plants indigenous to the Middle East which grow in seawater found near desert terrain.

Any story about innovation that starts with Leonardo da Vinci is one worth telling. The fact that the great French philosopher René Descartes also plays a starring role in the history of the contact lens makes this story of innovation all the more noteworthy. Conceived in the earliest parts of the 16th century, 34 million Americans wear thin film contact lenses over their eyes for some form of vision enhancement. The first true contact lenses was created by Swiss physicist A.E. Fick in 1888, when the lens maker fabricated a spherical glass segment for the correction of refractive errors in a wearer’s eyes.

The development of the roller coaster as a ride for thrill seekers is primarily an American invention but the story of the modern coaster’s development spans centuries and continents. Roller coasters have served purposes as diverse as human entertainment and coal transportation. They have been the centerpieces of some of the most famous theme parks in history. As millions of people lower their shoulder harnesses and strap in for the ride this summer, let’s take a quick look back at the intriguing story of the origins of the modern roller coaster and how it has changed over the years.

The two largest patent portfolios related to BLE technologies are owned by Irvine, CA-based fabless semiconductor company Broadcom and South Korean electronics giant Samsung. A market map view of the top innovators in the BLE space shows that not only does Broadcom have a slightly larger portfolio than Samsung, it has also dealt with far less litigation than the South Korean developer. The large collection of companies clustering in the lower-left quadrant of this market map represent companies with smaller patent portfolios and lower revenues. The dozens of companies dotting this portion of the map could be an indication that mergers and acquisitions in the IoT semiconductor chip space may be far from over this year.

A North American fondue restaurant franchise found out just how essential terminology management can be when it expanded into Mexico in 2010. A translation service provider previously translated its kitchen training materials into Spanish, specifically for the restaurant’s Spanish-speaking employees in the United States who originally came from various Latin American countries. Company executives thought the Spanish they were currently using would be sufficient for the menu and other materials to be used in Mexico. When the Mexican franchise owners visited the company’s U.S. headquarters, it quickly became clear that one dialect of Spanish is not always the same as another. Different countries have their own dialect with words and phrases unique to each culture.

The British legislation, aimed at curbing demand for cigarettes, requires that all cigarettes be sold in uniform packs with all branding, including colors, logos and other trademarks, removed. Companies are only permitted to print the brand’s name, in a uniform font, size, and location, on the pack, alongside health warnings and deterrent images. Tobacco companies have indicated that they will be left with no choice but to challenge the regulations.

IPv6 offers several benefits besides plenty of new IP addresses preventing device owners from having to share IP addresses. Effectively managed IPv6 networks can reduce the amount of information stored on network devices for routing packets to a destination, improving network performance. Hosts can generate their own IP addresses instead of waiting for a manual input from network administrators. IPv6 adoption also ends the need to use network address translation techniques for remapping an IP address space, which became necessary with the exhaustion of addresses in IPv4.

Everybody has to be careful because you’re right if we undermine our patent system that is the only thing that allows America to remain strong competitively because China they just have labor rates that are a fraction of ours. We couldn’t possibly make products as cheaply as China. We need to make sure that Congress isn’t hearing so much about how bad the patent system is that they without intention undermine it in significant part and then hurt our competitive advantage against China. I mean that’s all possible. I agree. I share that concern. Are we going too far?

In 2014, Samsung Electronics was second overall among companies receiving U.S. patents with approximately 13.5 patents every day over the course of a year. While much of Samsung’s recently acquired portfolio relates to semiconductor and memory devices, they are also a big player in wearable technologies. In fact, Samsung is the top filer of patent applications related to wearable technologies, accounting for about four percent of the 41,301 patents making up the wearables field according to a study by Lux Research of Boston, MA.

The bikini is an invention of fashion design that so rocked the world that it was named for a nuclear event, latching on to a growing zeitgeist inspired by the atomic bomb. So why are we talking about bikini’s? Frequent readers know that for holidays we like to find an appropriate holiday theme that allows us to write about patents, innovation, technology, or intellectual property. When we recently saw the new Carl’s Jr. commercial for the All American Burger, with its over the top American imagery, our minds started racing. How could we use that as a hook for a patent related article? Easy. We return to our evolution series, this time looking at the innovative fashion design icon that is the bikini.

SpaceX and NASA suffered a serious setback when the unmanned SpaceX Falcon 9 craft exploded, rendering its mission to deliver supplies and hardware to ISS a complete failure. Excessive pressure building up in a liquid oxygen tank of one of the craft’s upper stages caused the space launcher to break up shortly after leaving Cape Canaveral, FL. Air Force safety officers gave the command for the SpaceX Falcon 9 to self-destruct, largely so that fuel reserves could be burnt off and not dropped into the ocean.

A recent trend towards compulsory licensing has also raised red flags for many. In March 2012, the Indian Patent Office granted the country’s first compulsory license to a domestic pharmaceutical company for a cancer drug developed by Bayer AG. At a time when India’s economy is climbing to new heights and foreign investors are interested in entering the market, some find the fact that the Indian government would essentially commandeer foreign IP to be threatening.