Posts Tagged: "patent backlog"

If we can spend trillions in a failed effort couldn’t we spend a billion or two in an effort that is virtually guaranteed to succeed? I say for every $1 trillion wasted we should spend at least $1 billion on things that will work. By my estimates that means $4 billion more for the Patent Office. Not being a greedy guy I am happy to take that in four equal installments of $1 billion over a 4 year period. For those who are math adverse, that would mean the USPTO budget for FY 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014 would be whatever they collect plus $1 billion, which for FY 2011 would likely be in the neighborhood of about $3.2 billion.

Yesterday I had the honor of spending 30 minutes interviewing Francis Gurry, the Director General of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). The Director General spoke substantively about issues facing the Patent Offices of the world, as well as some possible solutions. Gurry also discusses harmonization attempts, work-sharing agreements and the crushing worldwide backlog of patent applications that could lead to irrelevance of the system. As you read the interview you will also see that he thinks it is possible that the rest of the world will adopt a US-like grace period.

Louis Foreman sent the letter reproduced below to Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT), who is Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee. As his letter explains, Foreman supports patent reform because “leaving the current system alone is not an opinion, nor does it benefit anyone.” Foreman believes the patent reform pending is a “significant improvement” because, among other things, it will lower fees for micro-entities and lead to because it will “ultimately result in a stronger patent making it easier for independent inventors and small businesses to attract start-up capital.

Submarine patents are not ever likely going to be the problem that they once were prior to the publication of patent applications at 18 months and prior to the change in patent term. On June 8, 1995 the term for a US patent changed from 17 years from issuance to 20 years from filing. There is still an opportunity to obtain additional patent term, for example where the Patent Office interjects unnecessary delay into the process, but it is unrealistic to think that patents will remain pending unknown for decades, which was frequently possible and how Lemelson masterfully manipulated the system, within the rules of course. But the TiVo patent was pending for a decade, unknown and secret. That should not be able to happen and should justifiably cause an alarm.

The patent backlog and all of the associated problems that go along with it, such as the increasing length of time it takes to obtain a patent, is the largest single problem facing the United States Patent and Trademark Office.  In fact, this problem is not unique to the US Patent Office.  Other Patent Offices around the world are also…

On December 21, 2009, I embarked upon identifying the top 10 patent stories of the decade, which ends as we usher in the new year.  The Top 10 Part 1 identified what I thought were in the bottom half of the top 10, and while any top 10 list is sure to be at least somewhat controversial, it seems as…

Christmas is coming early for inventors, innovative companies, patent attorneys and anyone in the technology/innovation industry that relies upon patent protection. Faced with a growing backlog and long patent pendency periods in a difficult fiscal environment, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is reaching out to former patent examiners, inviting them to return to the agency.  According to…

Doll Urn United States Patent 7,627,935 Issued December 8, 2009 Filed February 5, 2009 This is straight from the “you have to be kidding me” file, and for more reasons than immediately are apparent simply by looking at the invention. This invention is a doll urn, which allows for the storing of a human’s or a pet’s ashes. The invention…

Mike Drummond, the Editor of Inventors Digest, sat down for an interview with David Kappos a few weeks ago while he was in Alexandria, Virginia, attending the Independent Inventors Conference. As has probably become apparent over the last several months Mike and I have been cooperating on a number of projects, sharing articles and doing some cross promotion. While I…

I am just getting back from two days at the United States Patent and Trademark Office, having attended the 14th Annual Inventors Conference.  There is much to report, and much to write about, and I will continue to digest, analyze and write about what I saw and my impressions in the days to come.  It is, however, undeniable that there…

Last month a two-day international symposium sponsored by WIPO concluded with broad agreement on the need to pool efforts at the international level to address the problem of backlogs in patent applications at patent offices around the world.  In 2007, the last year for which complete worldwide statistics are available, unprocessed patent applications around the world reached 4.2 million, and…

Last week David Kappos addressed the IPO annual meeting in Chicago, Illinois.  Kappos’ remarks were varied and really set a new tone for the future of the USPTO under his watch.  Kappos continued the theme he has already established in differentiating how the USPTO will run under his regime, as compared to how it ran under the previous regime.  Specifically,…

EDITORIAL NOTE: What follows was submitted by Ron Katznelson as a comment to Why a Global Patent System is a Bad Idea, which took issue with the articulate position of Microsoft’s Deputy General Counsel Horacio Gutierrez that a global patent system is necessary. It is republished here as an article with the permission of Dr. Katznelson. *********** What seems to be…

Something came up in the comments to a post earlier today and I want to address it and definitively debunk the rewriting of history that seems to already be started with respect to who is to blame for the problems of the patent system.  The question arises with respect to whether the Patent Office has created their own mess by…

It is no longer news that the United States Patent Office is hopelessly behind, and many inventors and the companies they work for are waiting extraordinary periods of time to even get a patent examiner to pick up their patent applications for a substantive review. This has caused many inventors to indefinitely have their dreams, hopes and aspirations put on…