Article One Partners (AOP), the world’s largest patent research community, earlier today announced that the company has achieved a significant milestone — more than $2 million dollars in financial incentives to its global research community. This milestone comes 11 months to the day from when Article One announced that they had reached the $1 million award milestone.

The types of returns promised to investors and the types of benefits offered to participants are also quite different from garden-variety non-practicing entities, as are some of the tactics used in organizing the entities and in asserting the patents. Finally, the scale itself is simply mind-boggling. Mass aggregators operate on a scale and at a level of sophistication and complexity that would have been unimaginable a decade ago. They have taken the prototype strategies pioneered by a prior generation of non-practicing entities and changed them into some of the cleverest strategies yet seen in the intellectual property rights field.

We begin by discussing first action allowances and whether they are frowned upon, then discuss the examination process and weave our way to Track 1 and whether you really must use Track 1 for patents likely to be litigated because you get a much more condensed, streamlined prosecution history. Over the past 10 days I have also interviewed Peggy Focarino (Commissioner for Patents), Deborah Cohn (Commissioner for Trademarks) and Peter Pappas (Chief of Staff). These interviews are being transcribed and prepared for publication. So stay tuned.

As for the particulars of SOPA, perhaps there are some who are against the legislation for valid, thoughtful reasons and would like to see something better. That, however, seems to be the substantial minority. Those who are against SOPA seem to want to protect online piracy as if they are entitled to access the creative works of others for free. In economic terms those who steal intellectual property are freeloaders. These freeloaders are just like the many non-productive members of society who only take and give nothing back, expecting those of us who are productive to pick up the tab for them. There are certainly people in society who need and deserve help, and we should be there to help them, but by any fair estimate the entitlement mentality is running amok. No one “needs and deserves” free access to the latest blockbuster movie the opened just yesterday in theaters.

Leason Ellis LLP, an intellectual property law firm located in White Plains, New York, recently filed a complaint against USA Trademark Enterprises, Inc. of Sarasota, Florida. The multi-count Complaint alleges that USA Trademark Enterprises has engaged in false advertising and unfair competition by marketing a catalog of trademark registrations, which offers no value because the published information is freely available in the online records of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. David Leason, Managing Partner of Leason Ellis, said “by targeting our clients and us, USA Trademark Enterprises has interfered in our business and cast a shadow over the legitimacy of trademark-related communications. In filing suit, we are out to protect our clients, our business, and the integrity of the trademark process from predatory and deceptive marketing.”

Part 2 of my interview with Deputy Under Secretary Rea picks up with discussion of the America Invents Act. We generally discussed the rulemaking process, the fact that the post-grant proposed rules are a bit late in coming, comments and what the USPTO will do with them, as well as the upcoming Road Show the USPTO is taking across America for the purpose of discussing implementation of the America Invents Act.

Cummins Inc. (NYSE:CMI), announced today that Sharon R. Barner, formerly a top official in the United States Patent and Trademark Office and a leading intellectual property litigator, has joined the Company as Vice President and General Counsel. After leaving the USPTO Barner returned to Foley & Lardener’s Intellectual Property Department in its Chicago office, where she started with the firm in 1996.

Deputy Director Teresa Rea has now been at the USPTO for approximately 1 year, but seems as invigorated and full of energy as she did when I first met up with her.  She seems to love the job and relish the challenges that come with this moment in Patent Office history. We chatted for approximately 55 minutes, discussing USPTO hiring, the Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences, the America Invents Act, what a typical day looks like on her calendar and much more.

While formally compliant drawings are not technically always required at the time of filing, there are significant benefits to submitting professional patent illustrations at the time of filing. Indeed, it is my opinion that the better view is that formal, professional patent drawings are essential in any application. Remember, the primary benefit of filing an application is to capture a filing date that can be used to demonstrate priority of invention. Generally speaking, anything that comes after your filing date cannot be prior art to your application. In order to capture the full benefit of a filing date, a patent application needs to completely cover the invention and all permutations as of the time the application is filed, thus multiple patent illustrations are quite helpful.

If you are a small business owner, you are located in a small personal office or you work from home, you probably use either a cell phone or personal landline as your business phone. When you call a potential client, what shows up on their called ID? What do potential clients hear when they call and want to leave you a voicemail? What if they simply want to know your hours of operation or fax number? You may not realize this but your telephone system’s features, including your caller ID display and voicemail greeting, have a major impact on how others see your brand.

I have found it helpful to think about patent classifications as being large buckets with subclassifications being little buckets within the larger classification buckets. There are currently more than 450 classifications and over 150,000 subclasses. According to the USPTO, “A class generally delineates one technology from another. A Subclass delineates processes, structural features, and functional features of subject matter encompassed with the scope of the class.” It is also important to realize that although every patent has only one primary classification (class and subclass) it may include others as applicable to the patent.

The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is proposing rules of practice in patent cases to implement the supplemental examination provisions of the America Invents Act. The USPTO is also proposing to adjust the fee for filing a request for ex parte reexamination and to set a fee for petitions filed in ex parte and inter partes reexamination proceedings to more accurately reflect the cost of these processes. The USPTO published these proposed rules in the Federal Register on January 25, 2012.

The data clearly suggests that that inquiry should be made into what is going on in Art Unit 3689. If there is nothing odd after evaluation then I will be the first to report that and say that after further evaluation the patent examiners in Art Unit 3689 are doing a fantastic job. In the meantime, however, one way that we can get a more complete glimpse of what is going on in Art Unit 3689 is to take a look at the patents granted only after a decision from the Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences. Currently, according to the data available in the PatentCore system, 13 of the 24 patents granted have been granted after a decision from the BPAI, and 3 others were granted only after the applicant filed an appeal brief. That rate seems extraordinarily high to me, as does the 76.5% reversal rate at the BPAI. A look at some of the appeals themselves is elucidating.

After Judge Moore’s remarks, James Donald Smith, Chief Administrative Patent Judge, then took the podium to deliver his remarks and to introduce all of the new APJs; an impressive bunch that averages 3 advanced degrees in either science or law, some of who come from the largest patent law firms in the country, including Arnold & Porter, Foley & Lardner, Jones Day, Hunton & Williams and Finnegan Henderson. Others of the new Judges come from within the USPTO or the Department of Justice. Several of the new APJs were formerly on the Board and are now returning after a period of time in private practice.

The third annual U.S. IP Trends Survey, sponsored by inovia, is now open for U.S. patentees and your input is needed to make the survey a success. The results of the survey will provide an in-depth look at the global outlook and foreign filing strategy of U.S. companies and universities. It is anticipated that the survey will take only between five to fifteen minutes to complete, and responses will remain strictly confidential. Only aggregate, anonymous information will be made public. Click here to take the survey.