By Christia Gibbons
TNAZ Associate Editor & Regional Correspondent
Bob Forcier of Phoenix-based FlipChip International
Credit: FlipChip Intl.
Editor's note: This is the first in an occasional TNF series exploring the ins and outs of patents and patent reform.
Today's small business with big ideas needs to know the score.
China is developing an Intellectual Property Rights Strategy. Although new to protecting innovation, logic dictates that all those people will spawn some pretty good ideas.
Congress is faced with the Patent Reform Act of 2009 this session, after previous attempts at reform failed to make it out of the House.
It's a complicated redo that could fundamentally change what currently is considered the world's strongest patent system – a system that defined the innovative spirit of a new country and is guaranteed in the U.S. Constitution.
Pressures from competing businesses here and abroad put the onus on today's software developer, pharmaceutical scientist, chip maker and other innovators to educate themselves. And, be prepared.
Many countries operate on a first-to- file system, while in the U.S. the standard has always been first to invent. That could change. Other changes being tossed around could impact post review, publication requirements, damage awards, litigation jurisdiction and more – changes for the better or worse depending on who's talking.
Bob Forcier of Phoenix-based FlipChip International -- makers of flip-chip bumping and wafer level packing – said, "I'm watching all the changes very, very carefully."
Jackie Nicol of BioVigilant Systems is also a board member for AZ Bio
Credit: Mark Goldstein-IRC
About 5 to 10 percent of his sales are related to patents. "We have high regard for Intellectual Property on a global basis and, of course, on a U.S. basis," he said.
To Jackie Nicol, director of Intellectual Property and Partnering at Tucson-based BioViligant Systems, it comes down to having the protection that assures venture capitalists they're investing in the right place, and warding off copy cats.
"You need it. A patent gives you the right to exclude others," Nicol said. "You can dominate and others have to design around you." BioViligant invents instantaneous microbial detection technology.
Paul Burns, a Phoenix patent attorney with Gallagher & Kennedy, likens the patent reform debate to health care. "The thing of it is, that with comprehensive patent reform legislation as (previously) passed by the House that was biting off more than they could chew," Burns said.
"I certainly do not have the sense our patent system is broken. I certainly do not have the sense that it's harming the country," he said.
Where there's agreement on the subject of patents and patent reform is that the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office is overworked and the process of getting a patent is too long.
"Our nation's latest and greatest technology is in a warehouse," said Dan Leckrone, chairman of The TPL Group, which assists others in the development, commercialization and management of Intellectual Property assets. The international firm is based in Cupertino, Calif.
Leckrone pointed out that there are 1.4 millions patent applications and that it takes three to five years to get a patent in the U.S.
Dan Leckrone, Chairman, TPL Group
Credit: TPL Group
From judges making decisions on complicated and not-so-clear-cut matters in patent cases to who benefits the most by change to how the small innovator can thrive, it's evident that people need answers.
In October, a group of attorneys and U.S. Court of Appeals judges are meeting in the Tenth annual Sedona, AZ Conference on Patent Litigation, which will include a session on patent reform.
It is just one of many groups trying to figure things out.
Back to China.
That patents, trade secrets, copyrights and trademarks are required to do business defies both the Confucian thought of self discipline and the Maoist system of tools for the common good. So some cultural change is in order, said attorney Karen Dickinson, a partner in the Phoenix office of Quarles & Brady.
The Chinese software industry reaped in $7 billion in sales revenue last year – the same year it devised a national Intellectual Property Rights strategy, she said.
Speaking recently during a forum on the history and future of U.S.-China relations at Arizona State University, Dickinson said China is five to 10 years from a fully functioning Intellectual Property Rights system.
China grabbles with such issues of "saving face," governmental control and courts that hold in favor of an infringer because jobs would be lost if an injunction was filed against one. Still, it is in a position to create a strong system, balancing the strengths and weaknesses of other systems in the world.