Consumer groups back patent bill
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Five consumer groups have given their support to legislation that would overhaul the U.S. patent system, saying the bill would create fairer penalties for infringement.
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It's not like a business group to oppose the largest possible tax breaks for its members. But when it comes to sweetening a minimum wage bill with small business tax relief, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is backing a House proposal that is a fraction of the size of a tax package passed by the Senate.
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Silicon Valley tycoons, Nobel laureates and Hollywood celebrities are backing a measure on California's Nov. 2 ballot to devote &#36;3 billion to human embryonic stem cell experiments in what would be the biggest-ever state-supported scientific research program in the country.
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Executives and lobbyists from some  of America's richest and most influential companies are walking  the halls of Congress, buttonholing senators to argue for  strong patents to preserve U.S. innovation.
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Industry groups are looking for a way around controversial copyright proposal.
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The Patents (Third) Amendment Bill, which might be tabled in Parliament during the coming winter session, is a Bill which will pave the way for a new patent law.
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A new political action committee supports candidates who speak for the consumer when it comes to copyright law. The group doesn't have the big bucks of the entertainment companies, but it's just getting started. By Katie Dean.
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Internet service providers and other technology firms are proposing to soften a bill in Congress that they claim will make them targets of frivolous entertainment industry copyright lawsuits.    The group, which includes Verizon Communications Inc., SBC Communications Inc...
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A plan to help network various consumer devices is getting a boost this week thanks to a newly formed group of consumer electronics companies and chipmakers.
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Patent reform legislation before the U.S. Congress would kill the value of patents and allow companies from other countries to steal U.S. intellectual property, a group of inventors said Thursday.
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A handful of lawmakers, law professors, and consumer groups have raised objections to a new U.S. copyright bill that could significantly increase the fines for copyright infringement.
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Silicon Valley tycoons, Nobel laureates and Hollywood celebrities are backing a measure on California&#39;s Nov. 2 ballot to devote $3 billion to human embryonic stem cell experiments in
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(InfoWorld) - In the wake of a recent landmark Supreme Court ruling, patent reform is bubbling toward a boil on Capitol Hill, where advocates in both parties and both chambers are urging timely action on pending legislation and contending with well-financed interest groups on both sides of the issue. "This is a big fight about winners and losers," said Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., adding that he is not entirely satisfied with the pending Patent Reform Act of 2007, which was introduced in the Senate in April. "The question is how do we strike the balance." The Patent Reform Act legislation would make the requirements for obtaining a new patent more stringent, make it easier for rivals to challenge patents, and reduce the penalties for patent violations. Committee chairman Patrick Leahy of Vermont said that he, Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, and a number of other colleagues have been working on the nonpartisan bill for several years and that the existing patent system was designed for a bygone era. A decision by the Supreme Court in April in the case of KSR International vs. Teleflex marked a major clarification of the court's thinking about the granting of patents for new inventions and set a higher bar for what qualifies as an original invention. The ruling has already prompted legal wrangling between VoIP vendor Vonage in its ongoing dispute with Verizon over Internet telephony patents, and legal experts say that the ruling was a direct rebuke to lower courts that have tended to favor patent owners over those challenging the legality of patents that have been issued. Despite strong support from Democratic and Republican leaders in both chambers for change in the patent system, however, passage of the bill into law is not assured.Â  IT behemoths, including Cisco, Apple, Dell, HP, Microsoft, and Oracle, have aligned as the Coalition for Patent Fairness to press for the sweeping changes envisioned in the bill. They maintain that reforms are necessary to reduce costly, sometimes frivolous litigation. However, other technology companies, including InterDigital Communications and Qualcomm, have banded together as the Innovation Alliance and joined the biotechnology and manufacturing sectors to limit changes to the system. They argue that the bill would give patent infringers an advantage. The high stakes involved in the patent issue were illustrated June 6 at a hearing of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, which was briefly delayed as committee aides tried to locate an extra room for the overflowing crowd. "What we're trying to do here is move the process forward," Sen. Orrin Hatch said in an appeal to lobbyists for compromise once the hearing got started. "There are a number of organizations who could stop this bill." The bill's two main sticking points are a provision that would give the public a new opportunity to review patents after they've been granted, and a provision granting the right for an immediate appeal to the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit after a district court has made a pre-trial ruling on the framework that will be used to determine infringement (known as a "claim construction"). Large IT companies and the financial industry support the "post-grant review" of patents, which would allow for a reevaluation of suspect patent claims before companies are forced to go through lengthy, costly litigation, John Squires, chief intellectual property counsel at Goldman, Sachs & Co., told the committee. Opponents countered that the proposed post-grant review process would create an essentially limitless opportunity for rivals to challenge patents. "If a patent can be easily challenged at any time under a low standard of proof, (then) patents will have much less value, and investment predicated upon them will inevitably be diminished," Kathryn Biberstein, senior vice president of Alkermes, a biotechnology company, told the committee in her testimony. "This, in turn, will likely result in fewer cures for diseases and other breakthrough biotechnology products." The biotech industry and the Innovation Alliance also oppose the right for an immediate appeal after a claim construction ruling, arguing that it would encourage appeals, further prolonging cases. But advocates, including Palm senior vice president Mary Doyle, said it would reduce the chance of conducting unnecessary trials and cut down litigation costs. The witnesses were eager to raise two other controversial provisions in the legislation, regarding how damages in patent cases are determined and the expansion of the Patent and Trademark Office's authority to make rules. Doyle and Squires, supporting the bill's "mandatory apportionment" of damages provision, told the committee that damages today can be unreasonably high because the calculation is based on the value of an entire product, not just the patented feature at issue. Countering that argument, Biberstein and Bruce Bernstein, chief intellectual property and licensing officer at InterDigital, said that the provision would replace today's market-oriented valuation of inventions with subjective jury findings. Debate on expanding the PTO's rulemaking authority mirrored the rest of the patent debate with representatives from the financial sector and the Coalition for Patent Reform joining forces in support, while witnesses from the biotechnology sector and the Innovation Alliance cautioned against the change. An identical House version of the Patent Reform Act is pending, having recently won approval by the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Intellectual Property. Leahy said he is eager to prepare the legislation for a vote by the Senate Judiciary Committee, but he did not indicate when that vote might occur.ADVERTISEMENTIBM Information On Demand 2006Industrial Industry Leaders, please join us at IBM's premier information management global event, IBM Information On Demand 2006, October 15-20, Anaheim, CA. More IBM business and technical solutions content in one place than ever before! Select from  over 800 sessions. Register today!
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Two consumer groups back a new bill aimed at cutting fees charged to cell phone customers.
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Backs Comptroller General in patent denial The High Court has backed the Comptroller General of Patents in refusing a company a patent for inventions which were computer programs. The ruling in the appeal followed the lead of a recent landmark case.â¦
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The House yesterday passed the most comprehensive patent reform in half a century, delivering a victory for computer technology and financial services companies and leaving drug companies, small inventors, and the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office bracing for a bigger fight before the bill hits the...
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A congressional panel approved a bill on Tuesday that would cut lead content in toys and boost the funding and clout of the Consumer Product Safety Commission, following a wave of product recalls.