Modern Day Intellectual Property: The Alice V. CLS Bank Case

The Leahy-Smith America Invents Act, passed on September 16, 2011, was the most significant reform to the patent system in the United States since the Patent Act of 1952, which redefined the patentability of patent to include being nonobvious in addition to new and useful (1). The demanding need for patent reform had been discussed and debated frequently both within the literature focusing on patent trolls and consistently in Congress with the introduction of many patent reform acts that were never enacted: the Patent Reform Act of 2006 at the 109th Congress, the Patent Reform Act of 2007 at the 110th Congress, and the Patent Reform Act of 2009 at the 111th Congress (2-5). The enactment of the America Invents Act in 2011 after the failure of previous reform attempts signifies its importance in addressing the pressing issues of the United States patent system. The America Invents Acts specifically aimed to confront problems that were impeding innovation: the ever-increasing expense of the patent process, the exploitation of the patent system by patent trolls, and the unnecessary complexity and inefficiency of the patent process as a whole.

The United States Patent and Trademark Office is overloaded with thousands of applications a year, given an applicant can even get their patent filed. In the pharmaceutical industry, the patent process is in dire need of being reformed. A typical patent last twenty years and the process is a little different when it comes to manufacturing drugs compared to other industries. Partly because in the medical field research is more or less openly shared. However, on the pharmaceutical side the more concealed the better the chances are to get good profitable returns. During the beginning stages of getting a drug to market the drug must be tested and adhere to the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) guidelines. An FDA approved drug means that the

The United States Patent Office (“USPTO”) faces criticism from its users and legislators that the timeliness of the patent process and ultimate quality of issued patents are inadequate. In order to address this criticism Congress made several changes to the authorities of the USPTO in the last decade and considered more changes in 2009. Nevertheless, problems persist and some stakeholders argue that reorganizing the USPTO as a government corporation would best alleviate these problems by broadening its authorities even further and releasing it from external constraints.

In the U.S. Code section 101 of title 35, the patent law allows for a patent on inventions and discoveries on machine, manufacture, or useful improvement, but it rejects anything involving laws of nature, natural phenomena, or abstract ideas. In the legal case, Bilski v. Kappos (2010), the Supreme Court was forced to find a new set of rules on software patenting. The case was over a software that used a mathematical formula to minimize risks from fluctuations in market demand. Before the case, patenting for software dragged on in court due to the Patent Act 101 machine or transformation test. Under that test, a patent is eligible if it involves a machine or apparatus or if it transforms something into a different state. The patent was rejected under 101 because it was too abstract and not an invention. Following the case, the Supreme Court examined the machine or transformation test and acknowledged that the test is not the only way to find if a patent is eligible. The ruling opened up more opportunities to define new processes for patenting software.

Every medicine has its own generic name, which is also known as its chemical name. The generic name is authorized by creators of the drug and usually describes the chemical effects that drug takes once it is taken. Medications that have comparative actions tend to have chemical names that resemble each other (Patient.co.uk). For example, ibuprofen, flurbiprofen, and fenoprofen are all painkillers. In addition to their generic names, many pharmaceuticals have a brand name which is also known as their trade name. Generic medicine receives it brand name from the company that makes it. The brand name

I'm writing today to ask you to put your full support behind the Innovation Act, also known as H.R. 9, and help stop patent trolls from damaging our economy. The number of frivolous lawsuits these individuals and their greedy attorneys file is unbelievable. Each year, they cost businesses around 80 billion dollars in settlements and legal fees. For some companies, particularly the smaller ones, these lawsuits can drive them out of business while others survive only by passing the cost on to consumers.

All this being said, I fully agree with your assertion, despite having more than enough reserves to fight common copy cat legal battles, Patents would be useless against the big boys who have 10s of millions of dollars at their disposal. Hence the reason our revenue platform was designed to offer both our software and quantitative services for free to all institutions. You questions are not only welcome they are very much appreciated. Keep them coming for they expose the fact we have left very little to chance.

Trademark infringement is a growing concern to businesses that has caused disruptions in both local and international trade. Infringement is the violation of intellectual property rights in which violators take organizations/individuals ideas (trademark) and market them as their own. Another form of intellectual property is copyright that protects people’s creating expressions. In the case of infringement and copyrights, the accuser can file a claim against the alleged group/individual for using their trademark or ideas. If they are convicted then they’ll be required to pay reimbursements for damages caused or losses incurred, prohibit further infringement actions, and recall all products that were produced, but there is a loop hole in this

Until the early 1980’s, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office refused to grant patents for computer software. However, a U.S. Supreme Court decision in 1981 forced the Patent and Trademark Office to begin considering software patents. In the case of Diamond v. Diehr, the Supreme Court ruled that an invention related to curing rubber could be patented. Even though the company’s innovation was the use of a computer to control the heating of the rubber, the invention was a new process for rubber molding, and hence patentable.

The intellectual property battle in the United States is first addressed in the supreme law of the land, the U.S. Constitution. The Constitution states that (the copyright clauses inclusion is) “To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries” (U.S. Const. art. I, § 8, cl. 8). This once again points at the fact that while human beings may feel that they have ideas that can better society, they may be reluctant to do so if they are not rewarded for these ideas in some form or fashion. The aforementioned

A generic drug is the same as a brand name drug in dosage, safety, strength, how it is taken, quality, performance, and intended use. Before approving

When a brand-new invention is guaranteed, it is either an absolute advancement or absolutely overrated. The financiers are either in the early phases of a wonder or the late stages of an investment bubble going after a mirage.

Gene Quinn (2014) asserted that anti-patent is an illusion created big companies, such as google, who are the dominant and prefer the abrogation of patent system so that the next generation won’t be able to challenge them like the way Google supplanted Yahoo! and Microsoft. He explained that anti-patent critics are intellectually dishonest. The society should blame the bad actors who took advantages of judicial inefficiencies rather than the patent system itself (Quinn, 2014). However, anti-patent is not a new trend. In fact, two hundred years of silent in the Parliament after the enactment of the Statue of Monopolies in England, there was a dynamic debate about whether there should be patents at all (Norman, 2009). The subject of patent reform

A patent is an exclusive right granted for an invention, product or process that provides a new way of doing something, or that offers a new technical solution to a problem. An invention in general must fulfill certain criteria in order to be protected by a patent. For example, the Patents Act, 1970 in S. 2(1) (j) defines invention as a new product or process involving an inventive step and capable of industrial application. In other words, an invention in order to be patentable must show an element of novelty, must show “an inventive step”, and must be of practical use. Particularly, the Patents Act, 1970 defines “inventive step” as a feature of an invention that involves technical advance as compared to the existing knowledge or having economic significance or both and that makes the invention not obvious to a person skilled in the art. In other words, patent rights are not available for new advances that are merely obvious extensions or modifications of prior designs. Besides, the requirement of difference over prior art, there is a requirement to establish the extent of common general knowledge that exists while

This idea of patenting technology has been long debated. In some ways, patents help push the boundaries and expand the horizons of technology. Patent laws help protect innovators who create never-before seen technology from having their idea stolen and mass produced by a competing brand name. Furthermore, these laws encourage these visionaries to be the first to brainstorm and develop a game-changing idea or to take a good idea and expound upon it. The Coalition for Patent Fairness is a group of companies dedicated to “enhancing U.S. innovation, job creation, and