Posts Tagged: "Senator Chris Coons"

The 2020 “Progress and Potential” report produced by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) focused on women and inventorship. Recently, however, members of Congress asked the USPTO to consider a gender gap in patent practitioners, rather than inventors. This request is based on an article authored by Mary T. Hannon of DePaul University that argued that there is a formidable gender gap in individuals eligible for the patent bar, primarily based on the categories of technical background required to sit for the exam. Last week, the USPTO replied to the December letter—which was sent by Senators Mazie Hirono (D-HI), Thom Tillis (R-NC) and Chris Coons (D-DE)—citing statistics that found 29.22% of the 397 applicants that have taken and passed the registration examination since October 2019 selected the “Ms.” field on their applications and that, of the 1,937 applicants who have submitted applications electronically since October 19, 2019, 65.67% chose the “Mr.” salutation while only 34.33% chose “Ms.”

As we thankfully see 2020 fading into the rear-view mirror and all look forward to a hopefully much better 2021, we want to take a moment to reflect on what the past year brought us and how the stage is set for another very fluid and consequential year for intellectual property policy. In times like these, it is clear that leadership matters more than ever. During some of the most challenging times our country has faced, there were a number of places where we saw strong leadership result in tangible progress. This year has already shown us a dramatic first few days. Beyond the tragic events in the U.S. Capitol, we saw the somewhat unexpected shift of power in the Senate to Democratic control based on the election of both Rev. Raphael Warnock and John Ossoff in Georgia. It is clear that the new Congress and the new Biden Administration will face huge challenges before we approach anything close to “normal” in any sense. That said, when it comes to IP, what can we expect?

The Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Intellectual Property held its last hearing of the year on reforms to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) today, three days before Subcommittee Chairman Thom Tillis (R-NC) is set to release a discussion draft of a DMCA reform bill he has said will contain “revolutionary changes to online copyright law.” Tuesday’s hearing included representatives of YouTube and Facebook; Twitter refused to participate, and Tillis recently published a letter to Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey expressing his disappointment with the decision.

Submissions in response to the United States Patent and Trademark Office’s (USPTO) “Request for Comments on Discretion To Institute Trials Before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board” were received through the deadline of December 3, 2020. The Request was published in the Federal Register on October 20, 2020 and a total of 843 comments were received. IPWatchdog previously highlighted comments from individuals and organizations including Senator Thom Tillis, Robert Stoll, Conservatives for Property Rights, US Inventor’s Randy Landreneau and the Small Business Technology Council. Below are some additional highlights from the many submissions.

The Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Intellectual Property on Tuesday continued its year-long series of hearings on the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), this time focusing on the question, “How Does the DMCA Contemplate Limitations and Exceptions Like Fair Use?” Subcommittee Chairman Thom Tillis (R-NC) said that fair use has traditionally been “a bit of a touchy subject in copyright discussions,” but plays an important role in encouraging free speech and promoting creativity. Rather than focus on legal questions of fair use like those before the Supreme Court in Google v. Oracle, Tillis said the hearing was meant to discuss how the original DMCA accounted for fair use and how a reform bill should consider it. Subcommittee Ranking Member Senator Chris Coons (D-DE) added that fair use is “a contentious and challenging subject” and needs to strike a balance between safeguarding free speech while combating digital piracy and ensuring creators are fairly compensated.

On Thursday, July 23, the United States Senate passed the Sustainable Chemistry Research and Development Act of 2019 as a part of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA).

In the first part of a two-panel hearing today on whether the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is working for the 21st Century, Senate Judiciary Committee, Subcommittee on Intellectual Property Ranking Member Senator Chris Coons (D-DE) said he was struck by the conclusion of a recent Copyright Office report that found that Congress’ original intended balance for section 512 “has been tilted askew.” Subcommittee Chairman, Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC), added that fixing the problems may require designing an entirely new system, as “the grand bargain of the DMCA is no longer working and not achieving the policy goals intended.”

A recently released report from the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF) argues that while there is no easy solution to the ongoing scourge of digital content piracy on the Internet, voluntary agreements between copyright holders and payment processors, advertising networks, domain name registrars, search engines, and other stakeholders can serve as an important complement to legislative and other efforts by governments. Industry should come together and engage in a cooperative way to find mechanisms to stop copyright infringement. If we want original content creators to create original content, then copycats cannot be allowed to profit on the work done by others. Sadly, copyright infringement is rampant on the Internet, which is one of the reasons why there is so much duplicative content. And the industry hasn’t come together to provide a real solution for creators.

Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC) and Senator Chris Coons (D-DE) this week held the first in a series of eight tentative hearings scheduled for this year on the topic of updating and modernizing the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Tillis’ goal is to address changes to the internet since the DMCA was passed in 1998, and by December 2020 to release the text of a draft reform bill for stakeholder comment. Senator Coons pointed out that the IP Subcommittee has been the most active subcommittee on the Senate Judiciary Committee, and Tillis said that the process will take place in the same vein as last year’s patent eligibility hearings, which involved gathering extensive input from a variety of stakeholders.

Things are bad for many innovators and there is little hope for improvement on the foreseeable horizon. Despite the best efforts of Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC) and Senator Chris Coons (D-DE), efforts to reform America’s patent system for the better have stalled to the point that the Senate IP Subcommittee is moving on from patent matters and will focus on copyright reform throughout 2020. “Given the reasonable concerns that have been expressed about the draft as well as the practical realities of the difficulty of passing legislation, absent stakeholder consensus I don’t see a path forward for producing a bill—much less steering it to passage—in this Congress,” Senator Tillis told the Intellectual Property Owners Association in an interview published earlier today. Sources tell IPWatchdog that it is not inconceivable that the Subcommittee will steer back toward patent issues – namely patent eligibility reform – but disagreement among the interested constituencies has shelved any hope for patent eligibility reform. Shockingly, the disagreement that has shelved the long-awaited legislative fix for 35 U.S.C. 101 is among those who support reform. It seems the various constituencies that want 101 reform have their own demands and – if you can believe it – would prefer no change to a change that doesn’t give them 100% of what they are seeking.

Managing Intellectual Property Magazine has named IPWatchdog Founder and CEO as one of its 50 Most Influential People in IP for 2019. Managing IP’s write-up pointed to IPWatchdog’s 20th anniversary celebration as evidence of the considerable influence Quinn, who was named as a “Notable Individual,” has had on the IP community. “[An IPWatchdog post honoring the two-decade milestone] includes commendations from none other than three former judges and two previous USPTO directors,” the Managing IP blurb noted. The 50 Most Influential People in IP list includes figures ranging from USPTO Director Andrei Iancu and Senator Chris Coons (D-DE) to Lord Justice Richard Arnold of the England and Wales Court, China’s President Xi Xinping and Banksy.

Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC) yesterday led a hearing of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary’s Subcommittee on Intellectual Property titled “Fraudulent Trademarks: How They Undermine the Trademark System and Harm American Consumers and Businesses.” The hearing included five witnesses from academia, private practice and the business community who testified on ways to declutter the U.S. trademark register, curb fraudulent trademark filings from China, and improve current mechanisms for enforcing trademarks in U.S. courts, among other topics. All agreed that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office’s (USPTO’s) August rule change requiring that foreign trademark applicants use U.S. counsel has likely only temporarily helped to ebb the flow of fraudulent filings from China, as bad actors are already adjusting their strategies.

On October 30, the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Intellectual Property heard from five witnesses on ways to improve patent quality at the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). The Subcommittee subsequently posed questions to the witnesses, including professors Colleen Chien, R. Polk Wagner, and Melissa Wasserman, to supplement their testimony. Those witnesses have now submitted their responses, which expand upon their various suggestions for improving patent quality.

The Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Intellectual Property, headed by Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC), yesterday heard from five witnesses on ways to improve patent quality at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). Suggestions ranged from fixing patent eligibility jurisprudence to strengthening efforts on international work sharing, increasing patent application fees, and allotting more time for the examination process. The majority of panelists warned against the dangers of using patent quality as a means to simply block broad swaths of patents that particular industries or entities don’t like, and emphasized that clarifying U.S. patent law would likely go a long way to curbing invalidation rates.

Senators Thom Tillis (R-NC) and Chris Coons (D-DE), Chair and Ranking Member, respectively, of the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Intellectual Property, sent a letter on October 21 to U.S. Attorney General William Barr and Assistant U.S. Attorney General, Antitrust Division, Makan Delrahim, asking them to “work with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) to provide guidance on remedies for infringement of standard-essential patents (SEPs) subject to fair, reasonable and nondiscriminatory (FRAND) licensing commitments.” Tillis and Coons applauded the Department of Justice (DOJ), Antitrust Division’s decision to withdraw from the 2013 joint DOJ-U.S. Patent and Trademark Office “Policy Statement on Remedies for Standards-Essential Patents Subject to Voluntary F/RAND Commitments,” but expressed concerns over a “growing divide” among the Department of Justice, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the USPTO about the role of antitrust law in policing SEPs.