Last night at the Smithsonian American Art Museum and National Portrait Gallery, the old home of the original Patent and Trademark Office, the Intellectual Property Owners Education Foundation (IPOEF) held its annual Awards Dinner. The IPOEF Awards Dinner is one of the great industry events; an unapologetic celebration of innovation. Each year, this Awards Dinner recognizes the Inventor of the Year, as well as recognizing an IP Champion, Executive of the Year and youth winners of the IP Video Contest. Manny Schecter, Chief Patent Counsel for IBM and president of the IPOEF, began the awards program segment of the evening by saying what is undeniably true: this evening gives us the opportunity to put aside our differences and disagreements and “remember why it is that we do what we do and celebrate innovation.”
Without intellectual property protections it makes it impossible for an innovator to compete, raise money, and succeed in business. That was a story told by Joe Kiani, Founder, Chairman and CEO of Masimo, who receive the IPO Education Foundation’s first IP Champion Award. “While the IP laws are still better than any other country, they aren’t as good as they used to be,” Kiani said on the video introducing himself before receiving the IP Champion Award. Kiani would explain that he doesn’t think of what IP laws mean to Massimo today, but what they would mean for Massimo back in 1980. IP laws encourage innovation and entrepreneurship, he explained.
Jay Walker: “Any marketplace that cannot make a deal without filing a lawsuit in federal court is in deep trouble… The results of this mess are sad and unpredictable. There is less incentive to create long-term intellectual property. There is certainly more incentive to infringe if you can figure out what infringement is. There will be more secrecy and there will be less innovation or certainly a very different kind of innovation.”
“Basic levels of physiological function should be a part of our human rights. Every person should have the right to live life without disability if they so choose.” These words came during a TED Talk given in March of this year by Dr. Hugh Herr, inventor of the BiOM® T2 System, the world’s first bionic foot and calf system and the 2014 Inventor of the Year being recognized by IPOEF. Dr. Herr’s story is one of incredible innovation in the face of a terrible struggle to regain the mobility he lost decades ago during a fateful rock climbing expedition.
Last night at the National Portrait Gallery, which is the modern day site of the Old Patent Office Building, the IPO Educational Foundation awarded Dean Kamen the 40th National Inventor of the Year Award, and recognized Doug Henderson with the 6th Distinguished IP Professional Award. Also honored were the teenagers who won the 3rd IP Video Contest in three separate age categories. In attendance, however, was Senator Kelly Ayotte (R-NH), who is the Junior Senator from Kamen’s home State of New Hampshire, who promised to carefully consider patent reform and pledged to listen to the concerns of innovators.