President Obama Brings Major Patent Reform With the Signing Of America Invents Act
President Obama has just signed into law the America Invents Act. This is the biggest step in patent reform the US Patent and Trademark Office has seen in over 60 years. The newly signed law will give the UPTO the funding and manpower they need to not only help companies and inventors avoid delays but also avoid the unnecessary litigation we’ve been seeing as of late. The law wont go into effect over night. It will take another 18 months for everything to get settled in which time Apple will continue using all their manpower to sue the pants off of Android OEM’s. Here’s a snippet of the “press release” from The White House Blog:
The newly-signed law has a number of important transformations that will build on reforms already underway under the leadership of the US Patent and Trademark Office’s dynamic Director David Kappos. The law will give the USPTO the resources to significantly reduce patent application waiting times, building on the great strides the patent office has already made, including reducing its backlog by 75,000 during this Administration even as the number of filings per year has increased.
Excessive litigation has long plagued the patent system. The America Invents Act will offer entrepreneurs new ways to avoid litigation regarding patent validity, without the expense of going to court, and will also give the USPTO new tools and resources to improve patent quality. The new law also will harmonize the American patent process with the rest of the world to make it more efficient and predictable, and make it easier for entrepreneurs to simultaneously market products in the United States and for exporting abroad.
[Via Whitehouse]