Posts in Guest Contributors

Patent Filings Roundup: Battle-Tested Off-Roading Patent Asserted; Jack Henry Battered Again

Thanksgiving week was another light week at the Patent Trial and Appeals Board (PTAB), with 19 petitions filed (all IPRs).

The Threat to the New Madison Intellectual Property Approach

Makan Delrahim, the Assistant Attorney General for the Department of Justice’s (DOJ’s) Antitrust Division, has received much-deserved acclaim from fellow intellectual property hawks for his commitment to re-framing the Antitrust Division’s relationship with intellectual property law through a “New Madison” lens. Madison, the founder of the Constitution’s Patent and Copyright Clause, understood the nuanced relationship between the two. Over the last few years, Delrahim has gone to great lengths to restore his vision. It would be a shame if one significant oversight over music industry policy in the coming weeks incites a blemish on his otherwise impeccable three-year track record.

Future Visioning the Role of CRISPR Gene Editing: Navigating Law and Ethics to Regenerate Health and Cure Disease

As society adjusts to a new world of social distance and remote everything, rapid advancements in the digital, physical, and biological spheres are accelerating fundamental changes to the way we live, work, and relate to one another. What Klaus Schwab prophesized in his 2015 book, The Fourth Industrial Revolution, is playing out before our very eyes. Quantum computing power, a network architecture that is moving function closer to the edge of our interconnected devices, bandwidth speeds of 5G and beyond, natural language processing, artificial intelligence, and machine learning are all working together to accelerate innovation in fundamental ways. Given the global pandemic, in the biological sphere, government industrial policy drives the public sector to work hand-in-glove with private industry and academia to develop new therapies and vaccines to treat and prevent COVID-19 and other lethal diseases. This post will envision the future of gene editing technologies and the legal and ethical challenges that could imperil their mission of saving lives.

When it Pays to Talk About Your Secrets

The conversation begins, “Can you keep a secret?” “Yes, of course,” they say. What happens next? Naturally, you tell them what it is that you are going to trust them with. That’s the way it happens in personal relationships. In business, it’s usually more complicated. And it depends a lot on who you’re talking to. Let’s first consider the employee confidentiality agreement. In some smaller businesses, especially in the “low tech” economy, employee non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) may not be necessary, because workers neither create nor are they exposed to company secrets. But if you’re making things from a private recipe, or if employees learn sensitive information about customers, it’s a good idea to have these contracts. And if you’re in a knowledge-based industry, they’re more or less essential.

Congress, the ITC and the Biden Administration Must Move Forward to Stop Samsung’s IP Abuse

Last week, years of arguing and contention came to an end. The fight I’m referring to was not a political campaign, but that doesn’t make its impact on our country any less significant – it’s a victory that everyone can celebrate. Finally, the long-running patent litigation battle between TiVo and Comcast is over. Comcast had infringed TiVo’s patents and, to put it simply, was bullying the smaller company by weaponizing their larger legal team. Eventually, the International Trade Commission (ITC) stepped in and the two companies were able to reach a new, long-term licensing agreement. In doing this, a crucial precedent was potentially set – it will arguably harder for massive companies to take advantage of smaller ones.

Why It’s Time to Board the PCT Train: The Benefits of Filing U.S. Patent Applications via the PCT First

I am going to make a bold statement: every non-provisional patent application for an invention originating in the U.S. should be filed via the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) first. Then, after another six months, following the international search, and PCT publication, those who desire U.S. patents should enter the U.S. National Stage. That’s right: every single application, no exceptions. No, I have not lost my mind. Here’s why.