Law Commons^™

The Value Of U.S. Patents By Owner And Patent Characteristics, James Bessen

Faculty Scholarship

This paper uses renewal data to estimate the value of U.S. patents, controlling for patent and owner characteristics. Estimates of U.S. patent value are substantially larger than estimates for European patents, however, the ratio of U.S. patent value to R&D for firms is only about 3%. Patents issued to small patentees are much less valuable than those issued to large corporations, perhaps reflecting imperfect markets for technology. Litigated patents are more valuable, as are highly cited patents. However, patent citations explain little variance in value, suggesting limits to their use as a measure of patent quality.

The Measure Of The Doubt: Dissent, Indeterminacy, And Interpretation At The Federal Circuit, Jeffrey A. Lefstin

ExpressO

The law of patent claim interpretation articulated by the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit is commonly supposed to be markedly indeterminate, and to be responsible for a lack of certainty and predictability in patent infringement litigation. But there has been no attempt to measure objectively the indeterminacy associated with patent claim interpretation, or, for that matter, of any other field of law. This Article shows that under appropriate conditions the indeterminacy of a legal regime may be measured empirically by the frequency of judicial dissents. Application of this method to the Federal Circuit's jurisprudence demonstrates that …

Power Or Prudence: Which Is It?, Lisa A. Dolak

ExpressO

In limiting patent litigants’ access to the declaratory judgment remedy, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has primarily invoked the “actual controversy” requirement imposed by the U.S. Constitution and the federal Declaratory Judgment Act. However, an examination of Federal Circuit decisions and those of the district courts reveals that the courts have often confused, or blurred the distinction between, constitutional requirements and the discretion the Act affords the federal courts to decline to exercise jurisdiction. Specifically, the courts often attribute constitutional significance to factors that instead bear on policy.

It is important to distinguish between jurisdictional limits …

Scientific Expertise In Policymaking: The Case For Open Review And Patent Reform, Beth Simone Noveck

ExpressO

The Energy Research Advisory Board, the group of external scientific advisors that provided impartial expert advice to the Secretary of Energy since 1978, was disbanded this May. The Administration, like its predecessors, regularly replaces experts on agency advisory panels with ideologues and political allies. We are at the nadir of a historical progression since World War II away from trust in and use of scientific expertise in policymaking. This shift however, has not been countered with greater public participation. Instead, administrative law and theory have developed a model of the managerial administrative authority. The "expertocratic" agency relies on internal expertise …

Recombinant Proteins Containing Repeating Units, Qi Wang, Zhonghon Guan, Brendan O. Baggot, Kristen Hadfield, Jianmin Zhao, Janice Edwards

Brendan O. Baggot

Methods for the production of recombinant proteins containing repeating units are disclosed. Also disclosed are methods for the production of degenerate polynucleotides encoding said recombinant proteins. In addition, polypeptides and polynucleotides produced by the methods of current invention are also disclosed.

A Comment On 'Do Patents Facilitate Financing In The Software Industry?', James Bessen

Faculty Scholarship

'Do Patents Facilitate Financing in the Software Industry?' by Ronald J. Mann contributes empirical evidence to our understanding of how software startups use patents. However, a close examination of the actual empirical findings in this paper points to rather different conclusions than those that Mann draws, namely: few software startups benefit from software patents and patents are not widely used by software firms to obtain venture financing. Indeed, among other things, the paper reports that 80% of venture-financed software startups had no acquired any patents within four years of receiving financing.

Mark(Et)Ing Nondiscrimination: Privatizing Enda With A Certification Mark, Ian Ayres, Jennifer Gerarda Brown

Michigan Law Review

People in the United States strongly support the simple idea that employers should not discriminate against gays and lesbians. In a 2003 Gallup poll, eighty-eight percent of respondents said that "homosexuals should . . . have equal rights in terms of job opportunities." Even prominent social conservatives- such as George W. Bush-give lip service to the idea that employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is wrong. But gay rights advocates have achieved only modest legal reform on this issue. Seventeen states have prohibited employment discrimination against gays and lesbians. A seemingly modest bill, the Employment Non Discrimination Act …

Perspectives On Patents: Post-Grant Review Procedures And Other Litigation Reforms: Hearing Before The Subcomm. On Intellectual Property Of The S. Comm. On The Judiciary, 109th Cong., May 23, 2006 (Statement Of Professor John R. Thomas, Geo. U. L. Center), John R. Thomas

Testimony Before Congress

No abstract provided.

Pathological Patenting: The Pto As Cause Or Cure, Rochelle Dreyfuss

Michigan Law Review

The Patent Act was last revised in 1952. The hydrogen bomb was exploded that year, vividly demonstrating the power of the nucleus; in the ensuing postwar period, the Next Big Thing was clearly the molecule. Novel compounds were synthesized in the hopes of finding new medicines; solid-state devices exploited the special characteristics of germanium and other semiconductors; as investments in polymer chemistry soared, advice to the college graduate soon boiled down to "one word ... just one word[:] ... Plastics." Over the next half-century, things changed dramatically. "Better living through chemistry" has begun to sound dated (if not sinister). Genomics …

Intellectual Property Management Strategies To Accelerate The Development And Access Of Vaccines And Diagnostics: Case Studies On Pandemic Influenza, Malaria And Sars, Anatole Krattiger, Stanley P. Kowalski, Robert Eiss, Anthony Taubman

Law Faculty Scholarship

Achieving global access to vaccines, diagnostics, and pharmaceuticals remains a challenge. Throughout the developing world, intellectual property (IP) constraints complicate access to critically essential medical technologies and products. Vaccines for malaria and pandemic strains of influenza, as well as diagnostic and vaccine technologies for SARS, are not only relevant to global public health but are particularly critical to the needs of developing countries. A global access solution is urgently needed. This article offers a timely case‐by‐case analysis of preliminary patent landscape surveys and formulates options via patent pools and other forms of creative IP management to accelerate development and access. …

The Antitrust Legality Of Pharmaceutical Patent Litigation Settlements, James F. Ponsoldt, W. Hennen Ehrenclou

Scholarly Works

Several federal courts of appeal have recently ruled on the issue of whether a pharmaceutical patent infringement settlement, pursuant to which a generic drug manufacturer agrees to forgo marketing a particular drug in return for monetary payments from a patent-holding “pioneer” drug manufacturer, is a violation of antitrust law. These payments are termed “reverse payments” because, contrary to normal settlements, the plaintiff makes a lump sum payment to the defendant. Reverse payments have sparked considerable academic comment and controversy. Even more recently, the Federal Trade Commission (“Commission”) and the Solicitor General have expressed views on the issue, in the context …

Who Cares What Thomas Jefferson Thought About Patents: Reevaluating The Patent "Privilege" In Historical Context, Adam Mossoff

ExpressO

The conventional wisdom holds that American patents have always been grants of special monopoly privileges lacking any justification in natural rights philosophy, a belief based in oft-repeated citations to Thomas Jefferson's writings on patents. Using privilege as a fulcrum in its analysis, this Article reveals that the history of early American patent law has been widely misunderstood and misused. In canvassing primary historical sources, including political and legal treatises, Founders' writings, congressional reports, and long-forgotten court decisions, it explains how patent rights were defined and enforced under the social contract doctrine and labor theory of property of natural rights philosophy. …

Patent Drafter Estoppel: Why Didn't Sage Products Create A New Foreseeability Limitation On The Application Of The Doctrine Of Equivalents?, Christopher M. Kaiser

ExpressO

This article reviews the 1997 Federal Circuit Case of Sage Products v. Devon and the case law that has followed it. There is some belief among patent practitioners that Sage Products created a new legal doctrine limiting the application of the doctrine of equivalents in patent infringement cases. The new doctrine, sometimes referred to as “patent drafter estoppel,” would bar the application of the doctrine of equivalents any time an accused equivalent structure should have been foreseen by a reasonable patentee. Federal Circuit case law since Sage Products has diverged into two lines of thought: one that supports the thinking …

Intellectual Property: The Practical And Legal Fundamentals, Thomas G. Field Jr

Law Faculty Scholarship

Patents, copyrights, trademarks and related interests are known as intellectual property (IP). It has not been long since patents especially were regarded in U.S. courts, and the Supreme Court in particular, as tools of monopolists, and their owners often fared poorly. However, people have come increasingly to view privately funded innovation as critical to national economic well-being and to agree that such innovation cannot occur unless companies that succeed in the marketplace can recoup their research, development and marketing costs. That is a major function of IP, and, particularly within the past dozen years, IP has been seen, both here …

The Five Levels Of Inventions- A Classification Of Patents From Triz Perspective, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

The Five levels of Inventions is a popular concept in the study of TRIZ. Generally patent databases (like USPTO) classify inventions according to their topics or areas of invention. But they don’t classify inventions according to their easiness or usefulness or inventiveness. Altshuller classified patents into five levels according to their levels of inventiveness. The higher levels of inventions are difficult (and rare) while the lower levels of inventions are easy and plenty in number. This article attempts to explain the five levels of inventions in simple terms and the purpose behind such a classification. Although there are limitations and …

The British Empire Patent 1901-1923: The ‘Global’ Patent That Never Was, Christopher Wadlow

Christopher Wadlow

Reflects on the lessons which unsuccessful efforts to introduce a British Empire patent prior to 1923 may offer for the European Community patent. Reviews the origin of the proposal in 1901, the state of patent law across the Empire at the time, the progress made at several Imperial conferences, key features of the 1919 memorandum and the issues discussed at the 1922 patent conference. Outlines the reasons for the failure of the 1923 proposals, including the problems created by Canada's claim for reciprocal treatment for its patents, and considers whether the EC Community patent has a greater prospect of success.

Parallel Trade, Unparallel Laws: An Examination Of The Pharmaceutical Parallel Trade Laws Of The United States, The European Union And The World Trade Organization, Julia A. Moore

Richmond Journal of Global Law & Business

No abstract provided.

The Patent Cooperation Treaty: At The Center Of The International Patent System, Jay Erstling

Faculty Scholarship

In view of the fact that the PCT is composed of almost 130 countries and that more than 100 national and regional patent offices, as well as WIPO itself, perform PCT functions, it is remarkable that the system operates so smoothly and continues to gain momentum. Perhaps the system’s greatest strength comes from the immense diversity of legal, linguistic, and national cultures that constitute the PCT. While the system has served to harmonize divergent practices, it has also been obliged to accommodate to the sometimes inflexible peculiarities of national law and procedure. The PCT’s ability to strike a balance between …

Commercializing Open Source Software: Do Property Rights Still Matter?, Ronald J. Mann

Faculty Scholarship

For several years now, open source software products have been gaining prominence and market share. Yet the products themselves are not as provocative as the way in which they are developed and distributed. Two related features of the open source model are distinctive: the use of collaborative development structures that extend beyond the boundaries of a single firm, and the lack of reliance on intellectual property ("IP") rights as a means of appropriating the value of the underlying technologies. Firm-level control of intellectual property is replaced by a complex set of relations, both informal and sometimes contractual, among strategic partners …

The Supreme Court, Stare Decisis, And The Role Of Appellate Deference In Patent Claim Construction Appeals, David Krinsky

Maryland Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Impact Of Open Source On Preinvention Assignment Contracts, Michael Mattioli

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This comment studies the implications of open source on pre-invention assignment agreements. Part I analyzes the basis for past enforcement of these contracts, with an eye toward distinctions between open source projects and more traditional commercial endeavors. Part II briefly reviews the history of patents and explores constitutional and contract-based arguments against the pre-invention assignment. Part III begins with a discussion of open source and then explores how this new phenomenon perfectly fulfills the goals behind the Patent Act. With these addressed, the central inquiry of pre-invention assignment agreements, as they could conflict with open source inventions, will be addressed. …

Estimates Of Patent Rents From Firm Market Value, James Bessen

Faculty Scholarship

The value of patent rents is an important quantity for policy analysis. However, estimates in the literature based on patent renewals might be understated. Market value regressions could provide validation, but they have not had clear theoretical foundations for estimating patent rents. I develop a simple model to make upper bound estimates of patent rents using regressions on Tobin's Q. I test this on a sample of US firms and find it robust to a variety of considerations. My estimates correspond well with estimates based on patentee behavior outside the pharmaceutical industry, but renewal estimates might be understated for pharmaceuticals.

Patent Law Viewed Through An Evidentiary Lens: The "Suggestion Test" As A Rule Of Evidence, Christopher A. Cotropia

Law Faculty Publications

The Federal Circuit's recent nonobviousness jurisprudence has been the subject of much criticism. Reports from the Federal Trade Commission and the National Research Council and a pending petition for certiorari to the Supreme Court all conclude that the Federal Circuit has improperly relaxed the nonobviousness standard. Most of this criticism focuses on the Federal Circuit's implementation of part of the nonobviousness inquiry - the suggestion test. The suggestion test queries whether a suggestion to make the invention existed before the invention's creation. The Federal Circuit allegedly requires a suggestion to come solely from prior art references. The court ignores other …

Constitutionalizing Patents: From Venice To Philadelphia, Craig Allen Nard, Andrew P. Morriss

Faculty Publications

Patent law today is a complex institution in most developed economies and the appropriate structure for patent law is hotly debated around the world. Despite their differences, one crucial feature is shared by the diverse patent systems of the industrialized world even before the recent trend toward harmonization: modern patent regimes include self-imposed restrictions of executive and legislative discretion, which we refer to as "constitutionalized" systems. Given the lucrative nature of patent monopolies, the long history of granting patents as a form of patronage, and the aggressive pursuit of patronage in most societies, the choice to confine patents within a …