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NASA to Auction Patents

March 31, 2012 By

NASA has developed many technologies that have made their way to ordinary usage. But now NASA is auctioning off — rather that giving away for free — some of its patented technology.

As reported in the media, the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center is partnering with ICAP Ocean Tomo LLC of Chicago to sell portfolios. The portfolion includes 12 patents for technologies including software, robotics, and artificial intelligence.

ICAP Ocean Tomo has scheduled the auction for next Thursday. For additional information, see the company’s website.

Anti-Software Patent Rhetoric Heats Up After Yahoo v. Facebook

March 14, 2012 By

Yahoo! is suing Facebook for patent infringement.

Now, the predictable, sophomoric fear-mongering stuff is coming out again. For example, Andy Baio, whose name is on eight Yahoo! patents, opines:

“…Software patents should be abolished, plain and simple. Software is already covered by copyright, making patent protection unnecessary.

Ask any programmer — developing software is as creative and unique as writing poetry…”

Yes, Andy, software is “covered” by copyright… but it is incredibly easy to design around a copyright for a computer program.

And, just why should there be an exception in the patent law for software?

Cannot software inventions be innovative?

Then why not patent protection for them?

It is always difficult to try to quantify the quality of a company’s patent portfolio, but each year the IEEE Spectrum publishes their Patent Power Scorecard, which is a compilation of innovation scores of companies by industry category.

IEEE Spectrum uses a modeling system for determining “quality” based on variables such as “Pipeline Growth”, “Pipeline Impact”, “Pipeline Generality”, and “Pipeline Originality”. Without going into detail, these metrics are based on such things as how many other patents in the same field cite the patent, and the variety of technologies that build on the technology disclosed in the patent Companies with technology leadership will tend to have patents which others cite and build upon.

So the #1 company in the category of “Communication / Internet Services” is (drum roll) Yahoo!

Walmart Launches “Get on the Shelf Contest”

January 31, 2012 By

It has always been difficult for inventors to get their products on store shelves. The decision of what to put on a store’s shelf was typically made by the store buyer who often went with the major brands.
However, Walmart has recently launched the “Get on the Shelf Contest” that allows anyone to submit video online pitching his or her invention. The three products receiving the  most votes will be sold on Walmart.com, and the grand prize winner will get shelf space in select Walmart stores.
The contest ends on February 22. Additional information can be found here.

Attorney Docket Number SIRIP003

January 20, 2012 By

Can you guess what Apple’s patent application 2012/0016678 (published yesterday) covers?
Hint #1:
The abstract of application reads as follows:
An intelligent automated assistant system engages with the user in an integrated, conversational manner using natural language dialog, and invokes external services when appropriate to obtain information or perform various actions. The system can be implemented using any of a number of different platforms, such as the web, email, smartphone, and the like, or any combination thereof. In one embodiment, the system is based on sets of interrelated domains and tasks, and employs additional functionally powered by external services with which the system can interact.
Hint #2:
The application claims the benefit of a provisional application with “attorney docket number SIRIP003P“.
If you guessed that this application relates to Siri, Apple’s intelligent software assistant and navigator for the iOS operating system, you are right!
For an interesting discussion of this application, see Apple introduces us to Siri, the Killer Patent in the Patently Apple blog.
And, presumably, the attorney docket number of the non-provisional is SIRIP003 (without the “P”).

USPTO to Open Detroit Satellite Office

January 17, 2012 By

The US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has announced that it will finally open its Detroit satellite office. The office will house about 100 patent examiners in the former Parke-Davis Lab. (Perhaps more interestingly, the building was formerly the headquarters of Stroh’s Brewery.)  Plans for a Detroit satellite office were announced in December 2010 but put on hold because of budget constraints.

The Patent Office has plans for at least two more satellite offices.  But where?

So far, efforts have been made for Austin, Texas and California.

Public comments on the location of the next two satellite offices can be made by end of this month to satelliteoffices@uspto.gov.

Microsoft’s “Avoid Ghetto” Patent

January 7, 2012 By

Microsoft has been issued a highly controversial patent that allows one to create a pedestrian-based route that avoids traveling through an “unsafe neighborhood”. Dubbed the “Avoid Ghetto Patent”, a “generation component…can analyze the information and construct a direction set that allows the user to take paths that take him to his home in a quickest amount of time while keeping the user relatively safe (e.g., taking the user through neighborhoods with violent crime statistics below a certain threshold).”
The system can employ an “artificial intelligence component” to draw “inferences” or “capture logical relationships such as theorem provers or more heuristic rule-based expert systems.” So if the “artifical intelligence component” determines that a potential pedestrian path might cross into an area having certain demographics, presumately the software would advise avoiding this area.
One can see how “inferences” might be drawn between the ethnicity or race of persons in an area and the area being considered “unsafe”.
So the question is: Why would Microsoft want the bad PR from such a controversial patent?
What were they thinking?

Merry Christmas!

December 23, 2011 By

U.S. Patent No. 6,350.499 entitled “Suspended Christmas Tree”

Follow-Up to Chinese Patent Filings

December 23, 2011 By

As a follow-up to a previous post regarding China’s surge in patent applications, it is worth noting several important aspects of the Chinese patent system. The first is that most patent applications in China are not based on substantive examination. Instead, the applications are simply approved if the application is correctly filled out. Essentially, most of the patents issued are “registered” rather than examined. Secondly, the filing costs for domestic companies are subsidized by the Chinese government, making it rather cheap to file in China. Third, companies which own a certain number of patents are classified as “high tech” companies which are subject to lower taxation, providing a powerful incentive for filing patents. As a result of the forgoing, at the present time, Chinese patents are oftenn of low quality.
An excellent blog post on this subject can be found here in the Intellectual Asset Management blog.

Worldwide Patent Filings Surge

December 21, 2011 By

The World Intellectual Property Office (WIPO) has issued a report (2011 World Intellectual Property Indicators (WIPI) Report) which details the state of world intellectual property filings — and the findings are that despite the economic downturn, 2011 has seen a marked increase in worldwide patent filings. According to the report, which shows data up to 2010, the US and China accounted for about 80% of the 7.2% growth in patent filings. After two years of almost no growth in patent filings, the US Patent and Trademark Office saw a 7.5% increase in 2010.  China saw a 24.2% increase. The European Patent Office experienced a 12.2% growth.  Also, for the first time, the Chinese Patent Office has surpassed the Japanese Patent Office in terms of number of filings.

The report shows that  computer technology, electrical machinery, audio-visual technology and medical technology accounted for the largest shares of patent filings worldwide.

China Leads World in Patent Filings

December 20, 2011 By

Thomson Reuters has issued two research reports assessing innovation in China. The first, Invented in China assesses total patent volumes and highlights growing areas of innovation activity in China.  Special Report: Trademarks in China tracks trends in trademark activity in China over the last 20 years and analyzes trademark activities of the world’s leading brands.

The findings are astounding:

Patent Filings: According to estimates, China now leads the world in patent application filings. By the year 2015, China will publish about 393,000 applications annually.  In contrast, US companies (and individuals) now account for about 240,000 patent applications per year.  However, the US Patent & Trademark Office processes about 500,000 applications per year, some of which are filed by foreign entities.

Trademark Applications: Despite being seen as a country that does not respect branding and where counterfeiting is still widespread, since the year 2000, trademark filings have increased 450%.

However, the research also shows that the most innovative companies in the world are located in the United States, Europe, and Japan. Furthermore, Chinese companies have been slow to expand globally — only 5.6 percent of Chinese inventions are protected by international filings. From what I see, this is going to change in the next few years.

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