If your organization identifies generic or geographic terms relevant to your industry or consumer base, such as .bank, .kids, .music, or .nyc, consider registering second level domain names reflecting your brands (e.g., suntrust.bank, hasbro.kids, ladygaga.music or wendys.nyc), particularly during the sunrise period available to brand owners. Do not overlook the potential for utilizing generic or industry-focused gTLDS to synergize your organization’s branding and marketing strategies once the new gTLD strings go live. A well-known industry term such as .bank for the financial sector or .sport for athletic associations, sports franchises, and sportswear companies may become the “go to” place for consumers interested in these topics. If so, these gTLDs may be important vehicles by which to promote your company and its brands.

Over recent years, online advertising has been a driving force in the growth of the Internet. As business owners, you never stop hearing about the benefits of having your own website and advertising your services on-line. I am guilty of preaching this sermon myself! However, because of the ever-increasing existence of badware, it has become increasingly difficult to know what ads or websites we can trust. Thankfully, tech giants such as Google, Twitter, Facebook, PayPal and others have joined forces with StopBadware.org and formed the Ads Integrity Alliance (AIA) in order to combat Badware, protect users from bad ads and maintain the integrity of the “online advertising ecosystem.”

Mr. Gurry said the Diplomatic Conference represents a success of the multilateral system, in particular in the field of intellectual property (IP). The Conference, which will run through June 26, 2012, also recognizes the contribution of audiovisual performers to society, culture and education. “Actors and audiovisual performers are fundamental to our capacity to experience the art that an author or composer has created,” Mr. Gurry said. ”Their performances instruct, move and enrich us and are intrinsically worthy of protection.”

Professor Holman not only teaches patent law at UMKC, but has a Ph.D. in biochemistry and molecular biology, as well as well as some post-doctoral drug discovery research experience. In other words, Professor Holman speaks as one who understands both the patent law and the technology involved in the AMP case. And what Professor Holman’s supplemental brief does is debunk the “gene patent mythology” fabricated by ACLU, PubPat, (and others), as well as “ a number of assumptions regarding the nature of the claimed subject matter” made by the original Federal Circuit panel which he characterizes as “unsupported at best, and in some instances clearly mistaken.”

It will enhance the development and review of innovative new therapies through increased transparency and scientific dialogue, advancements in regulatory science and strengthened post-market review. It will also increase FDA’s access to external expertise to improve the drug review process. FDASIA will foster timely interactive communication with sponsors during the drug development phase as a core Agency activity to facilitate the conduct of efficient and effective drug development programs and help make safe and effective drugs available to the American public in a timely manner.

Earlier in the week BIO also unveiled another report it commissioned and which was authored by Lori Pressman, David Roessner, Jennifer Bond, Sumiye Okubo, and Mark Planting. This report, titled Taking Stock: How Global Biotechnology Benefits from Intellectual Property Rights, discusses the role of intellectual property rights in encouraging upstream research and development as well as downstream commercialization of biotechnology. More specifically, the report outlines how intellectual property rights and technology transfer mechanisms encourage collaboration and lead to the research and development of new biotechnologies, particularly in emerging and developing economies.

An assignment indicates who owns an issued patent or pending patent application. They are registered with the USPTO and available for public inspection. There is a special type of assignment called a “security agreement”. A security agreement indicates that a patent owner has used its patents as collateral for a loan. The security agreement says that the lender will get ownership of the patent if the current patent owner defaults on the loan. The security agreement also restricts what the patent owner can do with its patent so that the value of the patent is preserved. A patent owner might be obligated, for example, to pay the maintenance fees for an issued patent. Once the loan is paid off, the security agreement is released. If the loan goes into default, however, the ownership of the patent is transferred to the lender.

Earlier today David Kappos, the Director of the USPTO, testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee at the Senate’s first oversight hearing of the America Invents Act. Among other things, Director Kappos noted that the USPTO continues to move forward on AIA implementation, saying that the much anticipated new rules packages to implement the next round of AIA changes will be released on or before August 16, 2012. Kappos also revealed that the USPTO received over 600 comments relative to the location of the additional Satellite Patent Offices called for in the AIA. Kappos told the Senators that he expects to complete that review process and announce the next Satellite location something this summer. Kappos also discussed patent harmonization, Track One, the Patent Prosecution Highway, the new pro bono program and more.

If you have not tried to use the After Final Pilot you should really give it a try. At our firm we have found examiners quite willing to work with us After Final under the Pilot Program and have had successful results. While not appropriate to do everything you really may want to do After Final, many times you can make at least some substantive changes that would have normally required the filing of an RCE or Continuation. I personally think the Pilot has already proven to be a success and hope that the USPTO will continue to extend the deadline until this can ultimately be made permanent.

Yesterday Leason Ellis announced that the case has been resolved with the signing of a consent decree and Settlement Agreement. Without a doubt this can be characterized as nothing short of a complete and total victory. The judgment was entered by the Hon. Edgardo Ramos of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York.

Last week, on Friday, June 15, 2012, Merck (NYSE: MRK) announced the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey (Judge Peter G. Sheridan) ruled against the company on the issue of patent infringement in its suit against Apotex Inc. According to Merck, global sales of Nasonex® in 2010 topped $1.2 billion. See Merck News. A variety of Internet sources place the Nasonex® market share of the inhaled steroid market at 47%. Therefore, this patent loss some 6 years before the Nasonex® patent expires is a big deal.

The disclosure requirements for these types of patent applications has been a moving target for years, which means that whatever the most stringent disclosure requirements are should become the target regardless of the types of claims you file. To ensure your software patent application has appropriate disclosure of the invention you should accept — even embrace — the requirements for having an appropriate means-plus-function disclosure. By meeting the strict standards set forth in the mean-plus-function algorithm cases you will file more detailed applications that have better disclosure and which will undoubtedly support more claims, thus making the resulting patent or patents more valuable.

Yet another ad that the FTC took issue with was one featuring celebrities including Kim Kardashian and Brooke Burke, which aired during the 2011 Super Bowl. In the ad Kardashian is showed dumping her personal trainer for a pair of Shape-ups. In the Burke ad consumers were told that the newest way to burn calories, tone and strengthen muscles was to tie their Shape-ups shoe laces. Clearly, the message is that you don’t need to work out if you wear Shape-ups, which turns out to be untrue. What a surprise! Frankly, I’m not sure that these ads deserved the ire of the FTC.

It is also probably correct to say that the current business model for licensing technologies is extremely inefficient, not only because of the lack of a central clearinghouse, but because many of those who would be most interested in acquiring rights to exciting new technologies are really too small to attract the interest of patent owners. Even if they are large enough to attract interest from patent owners it take real time and real money to acquire rights. You don’t simply walk into a neighborhood bodega and order the rights to X technology for Y dollars, put it into your knapsack and walk away. Negotiations are hardly standard, must take into account multiple unique scenarios and are like any other business deal — unique. That requires attorneys to get involved and we all know what happens then, right? Too frequently attorneys get in the way of doing a deal rather than facilitate one.

When approaching an obviousness determination it is essential to understand what makes the invention unique. It is also necessary to start to envision the arguments that can be made to distinguish the invention over the totality of the prior art. This is required because when a patent examiner deals with issues of obviousness they will look at a variety of references and pull one element from one reference and another element of the invention from another reference. Ultimately the patent examiner will see if they can find all the pieces, parts and functionality of the invention in the prior art, and indicating that a combination of the prior art references discloses your invention. There is more to it than just finding every piece and part, because on some level all inventions are made up of known pieces, parts and functionality. The true inquiry is to determine whether the combination of the pieces, parts and functionality found within the applicable technology field of the invention would be considered to be within the “common sense” of one of skill in the art such that the invention is merely a trivial rearrangement of what is already known to exist.