Original news and analysis on international IP policy
Sweeping patent reform legislation cleared a key United States Senate committee Thursday and is now headed for a vote on the Senate floor after compromises were reached on key sticking points in the bill.
LONDON—Leaders of the world’s largest economies struck a closed-door deal late Tuesday to create an international court for intellectual property litigation in a move sources said they deemed a best effort to turn back global economic demise.
Several German ministries seem to be in a footrace to draft legal text for a filtering regime blocking child pornography from German users’ personal computers agreed by the government last week.
The committee of the United States Senate drafting legislation to reform the US patent system made little progress at a meeting Thursday, according to sources, but adopted a bipartisan amendment and scheduled to reconvene next week to continue work.
In a trend appearing in other patent offices around the world, patent applications at the European Patent Office continued to rise in 2008, but at a slower rate toward the end of year. At the EPO, this was coupled with the lowest percentage of granted patents in its history.
Bennett Lincoff writes: If Choruss abandons the time-tested approach of licensing and relies instead on covenants not to sue, it will facilitate a brazen money grab by the major labels it represents, leaving songwriters, recording artists and music publishers empty-handed, and college students holding the bag.
A record number of cybersquatting complaints were filed at the World Intellectual Property Organization in 2008, and the organisation is preparing for a potentially much larger set of concerns as the launch of an unknown number of new domains approaches.
With over 1 million patent applications backlogged at the US Patent & Trademark Office, IBM legal counsel Steven Bennett and David Kappos urge adoption of a deferred examination process, which they argue will benefit USPTO, applicants and the public.
On 3 March, 2009, bills were introduced in the US Congress setting forth the proposed "Patent Reform Act of 2009". The legislation proposes significant changes to post-issuance proceedings available to challenge patents in the United States. US attorneys Matthew A. Smith, Stephen B. Maebius and Jon W. Dudas argue the proposed legislation will be a step toward improving patent quality.
Should national drug control bodies grant marketing licences to generic medicine companies only if their products do not possibly infringe existing patent rights? Yes, German pharmaceutical company Bayer told the High Court of Delhi last week when the court heard arguments in an ongoing court case on patent linkage.