Clause 8 Now Presented by Tradespace
Also: past USPTO leadership echoes Voice of IP, calls on USPTO to immediately withdraw proposed rules for terminal disclaimers; UPC turns one; BlackBerry feeds "patent trolls"
Clause 8 news
Eli here…
If you’ve visited VoiceOfIP.com this week, you might have noticed some changes. That’s because Clause 8 has officially partnered with Tradespace, the company behind our industry’s first end to end IP management platform powered by AI.
When I started Clause 8, the vision was simple: share conversations with the most interesting people in the IP field.
I’m excited to now announce this news that will take Clause 8 to the next level on this journey. This partnership will ensure that I will continue to have the complete editorial independence to interview who I want and ask the questions that I want while providing Clause 8 with the resources to reach an even bigger audience.
Tradespace’s CEO Alec Sorensen: “The team and I are ecstatic for the opportunity to help IP professionals stay on their game in a whole new format for us.”
I feel the exact same way.
We’ll be releasing the first episode of Clause 8 presented by Tradespace on Tuesday, June 11th at 7am EST/4am PST. A new episode will be released every two weeks after that.
I hope you subscribe and share Clause 8 with others ahead of the new season.
This Week In IP
Unitary Patent system turns one after its launch on June 1, 2023
Top 10 Juve articles re Unified Patent Court from first year
The European Patent Office (EPO) pats itself on the back:
“over 28 000 requests for unitary effect have been filed and the EPO has registered more than 27 500 Unitary Patents. This means that almost one in four granted European patents has been converted into a Unitary Patent.”
“The newly created Unified Patent Court (UPC) has received hundreds of cases so far.”
“Happy first birthday, Unitary Patent system!”
BlackBerry patent story continues: “BlackBerry (BB) Concludes Patent Sale, Receives $170M Cash” for “nearly 32,000 non-core patents and applications related to mobile devices, messaging and wireless networking.”
The classic story of an operating company transforming from being an alleged victim to feeder of “patent trolls” depending on its business interests
Flashback: at its peak, BlackBerry (aka RIM) refused to take a license offered by NTP in 2000, was sued, and ended up settling for $612 million in ‘06. The prospect of government officials, etc. losing their blackberries led to the “patent troll” frenzy, which in turn led to a series of anti-patent Supreme Court decisions and the eventual passage of the American Invents Act (AIA) in 2011.
Past USPTO leadership to USPTO: immediately withdraw TD NPRM
Voice of IP on May 21 regarding USPTO’s proposal requiring that a terminal disclaimer (TD) based on a second patent include an agreement that the patent with the terminal disclaimer will not be enforced “if any claim of the second patent patent is invalidated by the prior art”:
Like most proposed rules from the USPTO, these proposals are unlikely to become final rules. However, they’re definitely undermining the reliability and robustness of patents in the meantime. It remains to be seen if the USPTO is willing to change course in response to the overwhelming criticism (or if the administration thinks the patent and innovation community can just be ignored).
Is the USPTO considering withdrawing the terminal disclaimer NPRM because of the overwhelming negative reaction? The official line is 'no comment' but the USPTO is clearly leaving room to correct its course."
An unprecedented, May 28 letter - from Drew Hirshfeld (who served as USPTO Director Kathi Vidal’s deputy until his retirement, as the acting Director before that, and as Commissioner for Patents from 2015 to 2021), former USPTO Directors Andrei Iancu and David Kappos, and former Deputy Directors Laura Peter and Russell Slifer - is making it much harder for the USPTO to ignore those calls:
We take the unusual step of sending you this letter because we are deeply concerned with the substance and process surrounding the USPTO's recent promulgation of a rules package regarding continuations and terminal disclaimers (89 FR 40439). We call on your Office to withdraw it immediately. These proposed rules provide perverse incentives and threaten serious harm to America's innovation economy. They are contrary to law, and it will be argued that they exceed the Office's rulemaking authority.
…
The proposed rules package contradicts these fundamental principles of a stable and robust patent system.
The question remains whether the USPTO’s current leadership will have the confidence and ability to do everything possible to correct its course now. If not, calls for “robust and reliable patent rights” will just be known by the innovation community as clever doublespeak.
