Sens. Aim To Make Big PTAB, Court Changes To Aid Patentees
By Kelly Knaub
Law360, New York (June 21, 2017, 8:45 PM EDT) -- A bipartisan group of senators unveiled a bill on Wednesday that would make major changes to patent law by overhauling Patent Trial and Appeal Board reviews and infringement standards, saying the new legislation will make it easier and less expensive for patent holders to enforce their patents.
The STRONGER Patents Act of 2017, written by Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., and introduced by him and Sens. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii, builds on a bill that Coons introduced during the last Congress that never got off the ground.
The new bill, whose acronym stands for Support Technology & Research for Our Nation’s Growth and Economic Resilience, contains nearly two dozen provisions that are aimed at making it more difficult to have patents invalidated and easier to find infringement, among other things.
“Supporting American inventors is not a partisan issue,” Coons said. “We must work together to ensure that the patent laws keep up with the innovators, so their ideas and businesses can fuel the American economy for generations to come. This means working to ensure that a patent continues to play its historic role in enabling inventors and small businesses to get funding and protect their ideas from being copied by larger corporate infringers.”
The bill would limit America Invents Act reviews so that more than one review cannot be instituted per claim, prohibit petitioners from challenging a claim at the board more than once, prevent the board from reviewing a patent if a district court has already ruled on its validity and raise the burden of proof for invalidation.
It would also make it easier to amend patents by expediting the process, establish a presumption that patent owners obtain an injunction if infringement is found, and empower the Federal Trade Commission to get tough on abusive demand letters related to patents, among a slew of other measures.
Coons told Politico that he hoped the Trump administration would support patent owners more than President Barack Obama did, according to the media outlet’s Morning Tech report.
Innovation Alliance Executive Director Brian Pomper applauded the bill on Wednesday, saying it will promote innovation, competitiveness and employment.
“For roughly a decade now, we have seen a steady weakening of patent rights in the U.S., undermining the ability of inventors to protect their innovations from infringement from large corporations and foreign entities,” Pomper said in a statement. “The STRONGER Patents Act says ‘enough is enough’ and ensures that patent rights are protected as a fundamental underpinning of our innovation economy.”
The bill, however, wasn’t welcomed by all.
United for Patent Reform, a coalition of American businesses, slammed the legislation Wednesday, saying the bill should be geared towards helping small business owners instead of making it harder for them to combat litigation brought by patent trolls.
“We are grateful for Congress’ continued interest and work to solve the problem of patent trolls using low quality patents to extort settlements from small businesses, but this bill does not help,” Beth Provenzano, vice president for government relations and political affairs at the National Retail Federation and co-chair of United for Patent Reform, said in a statement. “The House Judiciary Committee held a hearing just last week where they heard how things are getting worse, not better, for small job creators trying to work, invest and grow their companies across this country. Now is not the time to take a step backwards.”
--Editing by Brian Baresch.
