Posts Tagged: "ipo"

If Snap cannot protect its ability to differentiate its platform, how is it going to compete with a rival that has more resources and a larger base of distribution? If Facebook and Snap compete on user experience, and that experience is essentially the same between both, there’s no way for Snap, the smaller player, to gain any sort of competitive advantage… An analysis of U.S. capital markets published last May by Ernst & Young noted that the decline of IPO activity over the past 20 years has been so significant that it has warranted conversations on policy action to reverse the trend. A restoration of patent rights, which gives a patent owner a reasonable ability to obtain and enforce patents, could very well have the positive impact desired to improve the business climate for IPOs.

A few months ago, a judge ordered Apple to pay the University of Wisconsin $506 million for infringing one of its tech patents. Last year, Carnegie-Mellon University won $750 million in a patent infringement lawsuit against Marvell Technology Group. With such big-money patent cases in the news, you might think that owning a patent can create a major windfall of profit for universities. While this has proven true for a handful of institutions, the truth is that most universities actually make little or no money from licensing the inventions they produce.  

Seattle, WA-based real estate tech firm Redfin went public after an initial public offering that exceeded expectations, reaching $15 per share and a total valuation of $138.5 million. The company offers a tech platform for real estate transactions available through its website and mobile app and relies on salaried employees instead of commission-based real estate agents. Between 2015 and 2016, revenues have surged by 43 percent from $187.3 million up to $267.2 million in 2016.

These revisions favor patent owners, according to Palmer, but not everyone is supportive. For instance, Bilski, Mayo, Myriad, and Alice have given several accused infringers an additional tool for fighting non-practicing entities. So. the level of support for these revisions will depend where you fall on this spectrum. That being said, Palmer does not think the Court will change its eligibility analysis in the foreseeable future, and Congress is not likely to take up these anytime soon.

Over the past few months, several of the major intellectual property organizations have developed proposed legislative fixes to patent subject matter holdings by the courts. The American Bar Association/ Intellectual Property Law Section (ABA/IPL), the Intellectual Property Owners (IPO), and the American Intellectual Property Law Association (AIPLA) have all released proposals, which contain a few similarities. All remove the novelty requirement from 101 since it is already contained in 102. Each provides that an applicant be “entitled” to a patent as long as the requirements of 101 and the other sections of the statute are met. These proposals offer thoughtful but distinctly different legislative options for legislative reform… Perhaps a focus on promoting understanding of the issues, coupled with time and patience, represent the most prudent course of action for now.

Although it seems likely that Snap will seek to secure around $25 billion during its IPO, the company itself doesn’t engage in a great deal of patent filing activity compared to other tech companies. According to analysis of Snap’s patenting activities published last November by CB Insights, a total of 46 U.S. patent applications filed by Snap between 2012 and 2016 were identified; this total is likely short of actual Snap patent application filing numbers during those four years because of the 18-month period it takes before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office publishes filed patent applications. Snap filed a total of 18 U.S. patent applications during both 2014 and 2015. 22 of Snap’s patent applications identified by CB Insights were directed at user interface and user experience inventions but other areas covered by Snap patent applications include automated content curation, network, spectacles as well as object, facial and audio recognition.

IPO supports legislation because the patent eligibility test created by the U.S. Supreme Court is difficult to apply and has yielded unpredictable results for patent owners in the courts and at the USPTO. IPO’s proposed legislative language would address these concerns by reversing the Supreme Court decisions and restoring the scope of subject matter eligibility to that intended by Congress in passing the Patent Act of 1952; defining the scope of subject matter eligibility more clearly and in a technology-neutral manner; requiring evaluation of subject matter eligibility for the invention as a whole; and simplifying the subject matter eligibility analysis for the USPTO, courts, patent applicants, patentees, practitioners, and the public by preventing any consideration of “inventive concept” and patentability requirements under sections 102, 103, and 112 in the eligibility analysis.

The Girl Scouts of America, in conjunction with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and the Intellectual Property Owners (IPO) Education Foundation, is doing its part to promote innovative thinking patterns among girls with the creation of the Intellectual Property (IP) Patch. The IP Patch is available to Girl Scouts in four different levels: Brownie; Junior; Cadette; and Senior.

According to the USPTO, the fee increases are designed to better cover the costs of the USPTO’s main patent operations as well as PTAB operations and administrative services. This would be the first major change in fees pursued by the USPTO under their authority to set fees since March 2013; that fee-setting authority is allowed under terms of the America Invents Act (AIA) of 2011… “The fee increase will exacerbate an already existing issue in determining which of these new invention disclosures should be patented,” NASA’s comment reads. “We understand the basis for the upward fee adjustments, but as a Federal Agency subjected to the Congressional Appropriations process, NASA wishes to point out the dichotomy of one Federal Agency’s ability to generate fees at the expense of others.” The direct impact that the fee increases will have on NASA’s patenting activities creates tension with NASA’s federal statutory mandates on technology transfer.

In its upcoming term, the Supreme Court will once again consider the extraterritorial effect of U.S. patent law; specifically, whether “the Federal Circuit erred in holding that supplying a single, commodity component of a multi-component invention from the United States is an infringing act under 35 U.S.C. § 271(f)(1), exposing the manufacturer to liability for all worldwide sales.” Life Tech. Corp. v. Promega Corp., No. 14-1538. Petitioners (all subsidiaries of Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc., which I shall collectively call “Life”) urge the Court to hold the statute requires “all or a large percentage closely approximating all” of the components of the invention to have been made in the United States. Though Promega Corporation has yet to respond, the Court should decline Life’s invitation. This does not mean, however, that the decision of the Federal Circuit, Promega Corp. v. Life Tech. Corp., 773 F.3d 1338 (Fed. Cir. 2014), should be affirmed. Rather, though none of the briefs filed in the case have said so, the Supreme Court should reverse because the single, commodity component at issue cannot, as a matter of law, even under Promega’s interpretation of the statute, comprise a “substantial portion” of the components of the invention.

The IPO recently filed an amicus brief at the Supreme Court in Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. supporting a flexible approach to awarding attorneys’ fees. Oral argument is currently scheduled for April 25, 2016. This case presents an important opportunity for the Supreme Court—consistent with its holding in Fogerty v. Fantasy, Inc., 510 U.S. 517, 534 (1994)—to resolve a circuit split regarding how to weigh equitable factors in awarding attorneys’ fees in copyright cases. Attorneys’ fees should be based on a review of all equitable factors and not a product of a formulaic approach that disproportionately weighs certain factors more than others.

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.”

On July 8, in In re Cuozzo, the CAFC denied en banc review of a prior panel decision that confirms the PTAB can use a different standard for interpreting claims than a district court. The patent owner in In re Cuozzo filed a Petition for a Writ of Certiorari to the Supreme Court on October 6, 2015. The response was due on November 9, 2015. If the Supreme Court takes up the issue, it could decide contrary to the current Federal Circuit precedent. It is also possible that Congress could change the standard for claim construction that applies to post-grant proceedings through legislation.

From tech developers trying to take a stand against tech-savvy terrorists to a pair of highly anticipated initial public offerings of stock for tech start-ups, there’s been plenty of news to cover in recent days. We also take a little time to explore research at an American university which has led to the world’s first-ever “freeze ray” laser technology.

This years’ list of the top 50 companies having been granted design patents was dominated by technology, automotive, and consumer product companies, with foreign corporations representing more than 40% of the top 50 with a total of 20 companies. According to the IPO data, in 2014 the top 50 design patent recipients received a combined total of 4,743 design patents, compared to 4,599 granted to the top 50 recipients in 2013. Specifically, the growth in 2014 was just under an increase of 150 design patents that were granted in 2014 compared to an increase of nearly 400 that occurred year-to-year from 2012 to 2013. Despite the recent slowdown, however, the prospects remain strong for continued growth in design patent applications in the coming years, especially as innovators look toward design patents to strengthen their IP portfolios.