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Tech pioneer Nolan Bushnell to keynote IPO annual meeting in SF

August 14, 2017 by Bruce Berman 0 Comments

This year’s Intellectual Property Owners Association annual meeting will feature a presentation by the founder of Atari Computer and Chuck E Cheese’s Pizza Time Theater, Nolan Bushnell.

Another keynote will be presented by John Cabeca, Director of the Silicon Valley USPTO. More than forty service providers, law firms and IP holders will be exhibiting at the three-day even from September 17-19 at San Francisco’s Marriott Marquis.

Mr. Bushnell, an American electrical engineer and businessman, has started more than 20 companies and is a video game pioneer.

He established Atari, Inc. and the Chuck E. Cheese’s Pizza Time Theatre chain. Mr. Bushnell has been inducted into the Video Game Hall of Fame and the Consumer Electronics Association Hall of Fame, received the Nation’s Restaurant News “Innovator of the Year” award, and was named one of Newsweek‘s “50 Men Who Changed America.”

2017 IPO meeting highlights include:

  • Monday Patent General Session: Alice and the 101 Wonderland

The law on § 101 following the U.S. Supreme Court’s seminal Alice ruling has been a murky morass to navigate.

With district court, PTAB, and Federal Circuit decisions that are all over the map, and calls for the abolishment of § 101, IPO recently introduced a legislative proposal to address the lack of predictability in § 101.

Panelists will discuss these issues, whether the current state of § 101 is promoting or inhibiting innovation, and what if anything should be done going forward.

  • Two Corporate Panels at 11am on Monday
  1. Patent Session: In-House Best Practices: Strategies for Adapting to a Rapidly Changing Environment
  2. Strategic Partnering with In-House Trademark Counsel
    ___________

For the full program, go here. To register, here.

Image source: ipo.org

 

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New certificate program in IAM for non-IP professionals is being offered by the Illinois Institute of Technology

July 27, 2017 by Bruce Berman 0 Comments

Lawyers are no longer the only people interested in intellectual property rights.

IP underlies practically everything that developed nations invent, author or manufacture. Professionals who are under increasing pressure to understand, help manage and maximize return of patents, copyrights and trade secrets include people like bankers, engineers, paralegals, marketing professionals, administrators, as well as those responsible for financial oversight.

Now, they can get the valuable skills they need to help businesses compete in an ideas-based economy.

Illinois Institute of Technology has announced that it is offering the Intellectual Asset Management (IAM) online certificate program to help to equip a wide-range of professionals to handle key aspects of the IP value life-cycle, including how to acquire Intellectual Property (IP), maximize value, and engage in patent analytics important for success.

Earned Credits

The IAM program’s three courses, which can be completed in twelve weeks, are derived from the IP Management and Markets (IPMM) master’s degree program offered through IIT in conjunction with Chicago-Kent College of Law. While the IAM certificate is an end in itself, those wishing to go on to the IPMM master’s degree program will receive twelve earned credits towards it. For student perspectives about the IPMM program, go here.

The faculty for the IAM program includes Mickie A. Piatt, Program Director, Associate Professor of Law and Deputy Director of the Program in Intellectual Property Law, at Chicago-Kent College of Law. Professor Piatt is a leading IP educator.

Jackie Leimer, who teaches Acquiring IP, was formerly Associate General Counsel, Global Intellectual Property for Kraft Foods, where she managed all aspects of the company’s trademarks and patents, including clearance, dispute resolution and portfolio management (65,000 registrations and 3000 patent families).

Professor Anthony Trippe is the instructor for “Patent Analytics and Landscape Reports for Decision Making.” This course is the first-of-its-kind in patent analysis, and is part of the IP Management and Markets Masters Degree program at IIT. Professor Trippe is an IAM 300 leading IP strategist.

Speed of Change

“The U.S. and other economies are increasingly innovation-based and content-driven,” said Professor Piatt. “Keeping up with the speed of change in intellectual property rights is a best practice not just for lawyers, but for anyone in business, management, finance and other disciplines. It is fundamental to maximizing return on investment. The online IAM program is designed to facilitate understanding of IP dynamics, and how best to participate in the upside of IP rights.”

Graduate degrees and certificate programs for non-lawyers have become increasingly popular. Outside of the U.S., they are being offered in such places as Singapore, Tokyo, Strasbourg, France, Sweden, and London. Some leading U.S. universities are now getting involved.

For more information about the Intellectual Asset Management program, including how to register for the Fall classes, which start on September 10, go here. Early application is August 11.

Image source: iam.iit.edu

 

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BofA, JPMChase & Morgan Stanley are top banks for patent loans

July 24, 2017 by Bruce Berman 2 Comments

Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase and Morgan Stanley are the currently leaders in patent-based lending, according to a recent update of a 2015 study.

Relecura, Inc., a California patent research and analysis company, reports that Bank of American had 60,093 transactions for a total market share of 16.87%. JP Morgan Chase had 45,304 transactions for a 12.72% market share. Morgan Stanley, which was number 11 on the 2015 list, came in at third in 2017 with 24,244 loans and 6.80% of all transactions.

The total number of transactions between 2011 to 2016 were 947,907, consisting of 356,287 applications.

Long History

There is along history of IP-backed bank financing. Businesses of all sizes and types have used it to raise money using patents, copyrights and trademarks as collateral. Distressed businesses tend to use it the most, perhaps when other sources of capital dry up.

In 2015, the key companies securing loans using patents include General Motors, Avago (now Broadcom Limited), Alcatel Lucent and Kodak.

JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Wilmington Trust, and Deutsche Bank were the top banks doing IP backed financing deals. GE Capital also was an active lender.

Several governments have been major IP lenders, including the China Development Bank, which in 2014 pledged the equivalent of $1.3 billion USD agains a portfolio of 134 patent and 34 trademarks. Korea and Singapore have also been active IP lenders.

Most Active Borrowers

Key sectors doing the borrowing include software and hardware companies. Other active sectors employing IP backed financing include digital data processing, digital communication, IT methods for management, telecommunication, semiconductors, and television & video transmission.

An excellent infographic summary of bank lending on patents can be found, here.

For the full May 2015 presentation, go here.

Image source: Relecura, Inc.

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Qualcomm counter-offensive reminds NY Times readers who put the ‘smart’ in smartphone

July 17, 2017 by Bruce Berman 0 Comments

Qualcomm is the first known patent licensor to tout its invention prowess in a New York Times ad directed at the business community. 

One of the world’s most successful licensing businesses reminded Times readers – in a sparsely worded, full-page ad that ran in the business section on July 17 – that it “invented the essential technologies that make your smartphone so indispensable.”

“”You know how you’re in love with your smartphone?,” ran the headline in big block letters. “That’s just the beginning.”

Fighting Back

The ad is a brilliant counter offensive move – one that has been much needed among patent licensors. It reminds diverse audiences, including the public, lawmakers and the courts, as well as its and other shareholders, that Qualcomm technology is ubiquitous.

Its inventions may currently appear most dramatically in smartphones but will soon be almost everywhere through IoT, as Qualcomm “leads the world to 5G [technology]”.

Qualcomm’s $23.5 billion in 2016 revenue was driven primarily by patent licensing.

This exercise in self-promotion, sadly, is necessary to remind audiences that inventions matter, and that Apple, Samsung, et al. simply do not have all of the innovation they need to sell products.

If licensees are not going to pay fairly for inventions that make their products special, licensors, like Qualcomm, will remind audiences about the technology that does.

Qualcomm can use the positive visibility. In January, the Federal Trade Commission filed a lawsuit against Qualcomm, accusing the company of using anticompetitive tactics to maintain its monopoly on a key semiconductor used in mobile phones.

“We put the ‘smart’ in smartphones.”

Days later, Apple, Qualcomm’s longtime partner, sued the company over what it said was $1 billion in withheld rebates. In the lawsuit, filed in Federal District Court for the Southern District of California, in San Diego (where Qualcomm’s HQ is located), Apple said the money had been promised in conjunction with an agreement not to buy chips from other suppliers or to divulge Qualcomm’s intellectual property licensing practices.

Invention Credit

The Times ad concludes with the url: qualcomm.com/weinvent. It leads to a thoughtful one-minute video that essentially says: “We’re not the name you think of when you think of smart phones, but we put the ‘smart’ in them.”

The Qualcomm ad reminds the world that Apple and other handset makers would not be what they are without Qualcomm inventions – which is true enough.

“Qualcomm – Why you love your smart phone.”

Go here to see a web version of the print ad.

Image source: qualcomm.com; nytimes.com

 

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Gene-editing break-through: can a collision of science, ethics and (patent) ownership be avoided?

June 19, 2017 by Bruce Berman 0 Comments

The USPTO decided in February that the rightful intellectual property owner of CRISPR in eukaryotes, a time-saving tool that makes it cheaper and easier to edit gene sequences, should be Feng Zhang, Ph.D., and The Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, not Jennifer Doudna, Ph.D., and the University of California, Berkley, who had conducted the earlier research.

However, Doudna and her team, which included Emmanuelle Charpentier, now with Max Planck Institute in Berlin, are on track to obtain a European patent for CRISPR. They recently filed an appeal against the USPTO’s decision, setting the stage for a showdown.

CRISPR will allow an organism’s DNA to become “almost as editable as a simple piece of text.” Using CRISPR, scientists will have the capacity to alter, insert and delete genes in plants, animals and, even in humans.

The implications are very big indeed, both in terms of science and profits, and, especially, ethics. Universities and businesses stand to generate potentially billions of dollars. Medical research will never be the same.

[For a good description of how CRISPR-Cas9 works, go here. ]

The battle lines are being drawn to determine the rightful owner of aspects of the development: Berkeley and Dr. Charpentier vs. Broad Institute/MIT and Harvard. It could mean an eventual pay-out of billions of dollars.

World-Changing

In 2012, Cal biochemistry and molecular biology professor Jennifer Doudna and microbiologist Emmanuelle Charpentier, now of the Max Planck Institute, changed the world. They invented CRISPR-Cas9 (as opposed to eukaryotes, which is any organism with a nucleus enclosed in membranes), a gene editing tool that uses a protein found in Streptococcus bacteria to chop up and rearrange viral DNA with precision.

“The implications of the technology were immediately apparent, astonishing, and perhaps just a wee bit scary.” 

“The implications of the technology were immediately apparent, astonishing, and perhaps just a wee bit scary,” reports California Magazine. “Ultimately, CRISPR applications might be developed to wipe out genetic diseases, produce bespoke bacteria that could pump out everything from hormones to biofuels, and engineer exotic animal chimeras.”

It is one thing to use an editor to eliminate genetic mutations, such as those found in sickle-cell anemia, writes the Wall Street Journal, however, “it is quite another thing to edit the germ line—that is, to make changes that would be passed on to future offspring.

“Would it be permissible, Ms. Doudna asks, to lower an unborn child’s risk of Alzheimer’s disease? If so, would it also be permissible to edit for greater intelligence or athleticism or even, say, for a particular hair color? While all such uses would ultimately require regulatory and institutional review, it is the notion of building a social consensus that is particularly fraught.”

The three main researchers involved in these patent cases have developed their own companies that focus on CRISPR: Doudna developed Intellia Therapeutics, Zhang developed Editas Medicine and Charpentier, now at a Director at Max Planck’s Infection Biology, developed CRISPR Therapeutics. So, both universities and businesses stand to benefit.

These university-based cases often result in sharing through cross-licensing. Remicade, for example, a highly successful biologic for treating auto-immune responses like Crohn’s disease which has generated over a $1 billion so far, has multiple university participants, but is primarily owned by NYU.

Who Benefits?

Yet another question that is raised: Is it right for highly endowed universities like Harvard to get richer as a result of government-funded research? Almost 70% of university research is provided by the U.S. government. Harvard’s 2016 endowment was $36.4 billion.

With the potential impact on society so great, patents may play much more than a financial role. They depending who controls them, they may turn out to be the lynch-pin for ethical application of advanced gene-editing.

In the most interesting chapters of her new book, “A Crack in Creation,” Ms. Doudna wrestles with her ambivalence about the tool she has helped create. She concludes that she no longer feels comfortable operating inside her “familiar scientific bubble”: She must take on a role as a public citizen and address not just the power of gene editing but the ethics of it. At stake, she believes, is “nothing less than the future of our world.”

Image source: bloomberg.com; rsb.org.uk

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Up to $600 billion in U.S. IP is stolen annually by foreigners, says report

June 1, 2017 by Bruce Berman 0 Comments

An IP Commission study finds that foreign sources, especially China, are responsible for the bulk U.S. theft.

Counterfeit goods, pirated software, and theft of trade secrets together represent a “systematic threat” to the US economy of between $225 billion and $600 billion annually, according to the findings of a 2017 research report from the bi-partisan IP Commission, The Theft of American Intellectual Property: Reassessments of the Challenge and United States Policy.

The massive theft of American IP—from companies and universities across the country, from U.S. labs to defense contractors, from banks to software companies—threatens the nation’s security, says the report.

The research, and update of a 2013 report, is the work of the bi-partisan IP Commission and was published by the National Bureau of Asian Research (NBR).  NBR conducts advanced independent research on strategic, political, economic and other issues affecting U.S. relations with Asia, including China and Russia.

The Intangible Investor in June’s IAM features a full perspective on the report, “Foreign sources responsible for most IP theft.” Subscribers can find a copy here.

Pioneering Research

Kudos to the IP Commission for establishing a beachhead in the global war to combat IP theft and cyber crime. Its pioneering research provides American and other lawmakers, businesses, investors and the public, with data about IP infringement that are cannot be ignored.

However, the report falls short. Identifying and stopping infringement, including cyber-espionage, should not be restricted to sources outside of the U.S.  The IP Commission’s research zeros in on foreign counterfeit, trade secret and copyright violations. It does not account for increasing domestic patent infringement and copyright abuses, which have profoundly affected the software, recording and other industries, and impacted U.S. jobs.

To be fair, this IP Commission’s focus is foreign IP threats, and it is a daunting task to estimate the financial impact of domestic invention theft on U.S. businesses – not just what gets reported in the press about settlements and licenses.

But speaking to a range of IP attorneys and holders, it becomes clear that much IP abuse comes from domestic IT businesses, Internet providers, streaming services, individuals and others that know they are unlikely to be caught infringing rights or will have to pay for a license. By the IP Commissions own admission, IP theft is less benign than it might appear.

The theft of American IP is not just the ‘greatest transfer of wealth in human history,’ as General Keith Alexander put it; IP theft undercuts the primary competitive advantage of American business—the capacity for innovation.

Inspiration and a Challenge

The IP Commission’s timely report is a challenge to IP holders, and lawmakers alike who are concerned about innovation and commerce. It is a call to examine the source, type, and level of domestic IP rights theft, including patents, on SMEs, inventors, and universities, and how they affect the economy now and are likely to in the future.

The full 24-page update, The Theft of American Intellectual Property: Reassessments of the Challenge of the United States Policy, is well worth reading. Visit  www.ipcommission.org.

The original 2013 report, Report of the Commission on the Theft of American Intellectual Property, is also available and useful for comparison. 

Image source: ipcommission.org; linkedin.com

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Startup mentored by Brody/Berman and Center for IP Understanding (CIPU) is LES Business Plan Winner

May 24, 2017 by Bruce Berman 0 Comments

Takachar, a small business working with farmers in Kenya to develop an inexpensive, ecologic method for turning biomass (waste) into fuel, is the Global Winner of the 2017 Licensing Executives Society (LES) Business Plan Competition.

The company, led by Kevin S. Kung, an MIT doctoral student, was mentored in the Business Plan Competition by Bruce Berman, CEO of Brody Berman Associates and President of the Center for Intellectual Property Understanding (CIPU), an independent, non-profit.

Takachar’s unique IP strategy provides farmers free open-source technology, followed by patents licensed to the company exclusively by MIT, trade secrets and trademarks. The goal is to provide affordable franchises in Africa, India and other parts of the world, where economical sources of fuel are crucial to the success of small farms and disposing biomass is a challenge.

The Global LES Business Plan winner receives a $5,000 cash award and in-kind IP support. For more information about Takachar, go here.

Second Global Winner

Berman also mentored the 2016 LES Business Plan global winner, Fruti-Cycle Project, an Ugandan start-up that provides affordable, portable refrigeration for delivering produce to market faster and with less spoilage. For more information about Fruti-Cycle, go here.

“It is a privilege to work with innovative and ambitious young people, like Kevin and Nelson,” said Berman, who has 25 years of IP consulting experience. “They have the right combination of vision, technical skill and tenacity to turn original ideas into businesses that provide timely products and solutions. Takachar and Fruti-Cycle Project are good examples of utilizing integrated IP rights strategies in diverse parts of the world.”

Takachar Strategy

Image source: Takachar

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Michelle Lee to keynote “Patents for Financial Services Summit,” 7/19

May 22, 2017 by Bruce Berman 0 Comments

The 14th Annual Patents for Financial Services Summit being held July 19-20 at the Sheraton Times Square Hotel will examine recent developments affecting banks and other financial institutions. 

The featured speaker for 2017 is Michelle K. Lee, Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director, United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

Ms. Lee will address “The Current State of U.S. Patent Law.”

IP CloseUp readers can save $200. Use code IPCNYC. 

2017 program highlights include:

  • Consider the impact of recent and pending Supreme Court cases, including TC Heartland LLC v. Kraft Foods (venue and forum shopping), SCA Hygiene Products AB et al. v. First Quality Baby Products LLC (the availability of the doctrine of laches as a defense in patent litigation), and of Impression Products Inc. v. Lexmark International Inc. (patent exhaustion)
  • Evaluate best practices in oral argument before the PTAB and pinpoint the necessary information to communicate in an efficient and complete manner
  • Identify where changes have occurred in patentability and if additional clarity is available
  • Provide practical advice for weighing the costs and value of opinions of counsel, including when they should be obtained and from whom
  • Review the law of patent eligibility as it relates to FinTech in a number of jurisdictions outside of the U.S., including Canada, Australia, Japan, Singapore, and China
  • Earn CLE: This program was designed to satisfy approximately 13 hours of Continuing Legal Education credit requirements and is appropriate for both newly admitted and experienced attorneys

For a full list of speakers, go here; for the conference agenda, here.

To register as an individual or group, please go here.

Image source: worldcongress.com

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10th Intl Legal Alliance Summit in NY, June 15, will confer IP awards

May 5, 2017 by Bruce Berman 0 Comments

The International Legal Alliance Summit & Awards will celebrate its tenth anniversary in New York on June 15, 2017 with approximately 500 in-house counsel and law firms from around the world.

Attendees will discuss such hot topics in domestic, cross-border and M&A intellectual property issues as IP strategies, patent eligibility and IP portfolio management. They will also be present to see honors awarded to the best legal departments and law firms in their respective fields.

Organized by Paris-based Leaders League, the interactive one-day program provided participants with networking opportunities by way of one-to-one meetings, expert-lead roundtables, and seated lunch and dinner and cocktail receptions.

The General Counsel Awards recognized the best legal, tax and intellectual property in-house departments, while the Law Firm Awards Ceremony in the evening will celebrate the best performing independent law firms. For nine years, the International Legal Alliance Summit & Awards has supported the players of the legal industry in the search of expertise, networking and achievement.

Fifty legal department from large international companies will run for the victory during the networking lunch and 150 law firms from more than 25 countries during the gala dinner.

Corporate IP Counsel

Speakers include senior counsel and IP executives from IBM, Philips, Microsoft, Mondelez, Caterpillar, Samsung, Canon, L’Oreal, Total, Lufthansa, MetLife, UBS, Open Invention Network and The Clearing House associations of banks. For the full list of speakers, go here.

The International Legal Alliance Summit & Awards is pleased to present its 10th edition of the Expert Insights conferences. Over 70 outstanding international speakers debated on the latest issues the industry is facing and highlighted the new challenges to overcome with their experiences, knowledge and analysis

Traditional conferences, say the producers, leave to chance finding the best networking opportunities. By using the internet platform, attendees can schedule one-on-one meetings of their choice.

The Expert Insights Conferences are the opportunity to benefit from 60+ experts of the legal industry. The ILA Summit will feature 14 panel discussions

For the 2017 program, go here;

To register, go here.

Image source: www.ilasummit.com

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97% of Europeans regard IP rights favorably; 41% ages 15-24 believe it is sometimes OK to buy counterfeits

May 1, 2017 by Bruce Berman 0 Comments

When it comes to intellectual property rights Europeans are highly respectful, except among the young, where buying counterfeits has gown.

That is the primary take-away of an extensive European Community survey of attitudes toward IP rights delivered recently. The findings show that 97% of Europeans believe that IP should be respected, and that inventors, creators, and performing artists need to be paid for their work.

In contrast to the overall positive regard for IP rights, however, 41 per cent of young Europeans, ages 15 to 24, said they believed it was acceptable to buy counterfeits if the original product was too expensive. 15% of those surveyed in that age group said that they had intentionally purchased a counterfeit product in the past 12 months, 9% higher than in a similar 2013 study conducted by the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO).

“European Citizens and Intellectual Property: Perception, Awareness and Behavior,” a 205-page research report, updates the first EUIPO provides further evidence of how IP rights are regarded by EU citizens at a time when encouraging innovation and creativity is increasingly the focus of economic policy.

“In line with the 2013 results, people do not always act in line with their stated position,” said EUIPO Executive Director, Antonio Campinos, in summarizing the findings. “The key 15-24 age group seems to have become less convinced that fake goods are damaging and is buying more counterfeit goods, mainly for price reasons.”

Significant Sample

“European Citizens and Intellectual Property” surveyed people across all 28 EU Member States about their perceptions of intellectual property survey. It consolidates results of more than 26,000 interviews and confirms the global picture assessed in the EUIPO’s 2013 research.

“Even during a period of economic crisis when household budgets have come under pressure,” the report concluded, “the vast majority of respondents agree that it is important that inventors, creators, and performing artists can protect their rights and be paid for their work.”

Eighty-three percent said they prefer to access digital content through legal or authorized services whenever there is an affordable option available, and 71 percent of those admitting to using illegal sources say they would stop, if they could access affordable alternative options.

Confusion is growing about what constitutes a legal source. In 2016, 24 percent of respondents, five percentage points more than in 2013, wondered if an online source was legal, rising to 41 percent among young people.

Half of the Europeans queried believe that strict protection of IP rights may, in fact, curb innovation, and more than half feel that IP principles are not adapted to the Internet.

Neither the 2017 survey and previous study focused on counterfeits and copyrighted content, or examine attitudes towards patents or trade secrets.

An executive summary for “European Citizens and Intellectual Property” can be found here.

For the full 2017 EUIPO IP perception study, go here.

Image source: euipo.europa.eu

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Fixing the patent system/ promoting jobs is focus of Capitol Hill event

April 20, 2017 by Bruce Berman 2 Comments

An increasing number of experts say the U.S. has lost its edge in the battle to secure and defend meaningful patents that stimulate competition.

It is with making U.S. patents important again that “Promoting Innovation, Investment and Job Growth by Fixing America’s Patent System” is being held on Monday May 8 at the United States Capitol Building, Washington, D.C.

The invitation-only event hosted by the U.S. Chapter of the International IP Commercialization Counsel (IIPCC), will feature an all-star list of presenters from business, government and law.

Speakers Include

Dr. Carl J. Schramm, University Professor, Syracuse University; Former President of the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation for Entrepreneurship; Board Member IIPCC; David Kappos, Partner, Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP; Former Under-Secretary of Commerce and Director of the USPTO; Q. Todd Dickinson, Senior Partner, Polsinelli, PC; Former Under-Secretary of Commerce and Director of the USPTO; Judge Randall Rader, Former Chief Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit; Board Member IIPCC;  Judge Paul Michel, Former Chief Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit; Charles Henry Giancarlo, Former CTO and Chief Development Officer Cisco Systems and former Managing Director Silver Lake Partners; Phil Johnson, Former Senior VP, Intellectual Property Strategy & Policy, Johnson & Johnson; Marshall Phelps, Vice-Chairman, Center for IP Understanding; former VP IP for Microsoft, IBM, Bob Pavey, Partner Emeritus, Morgenthaler Ventures; former Chairman of the National Venture Capital Association;

Manny W. Schecter, Chief Patent Counsel, IBM Corporation; Laurie C. Self, VP and Counsel, Governmental Affairs, Qualcomm; Bill Elkington, Chair & President Elect, LES USA and Canada; Senior Director, IP Management, Rockwell Collins; Orin Herskowitz, SVP of IP & Tech Transfer, Columbia University; Executive Director of Columbia Technology Ventures; Teaches ‘IP for Entrepreneurs’ in Columbia’s Engineering School; Professor Adam Mossoff, Director, Center for Protection of Intellectual Property, George Mason; Professor Jeffrey A Lefstin, Associate Academic Dean and Professor of Law, UC Hastings; Robert B. Aronoff,  U.S. Executive Director, International IP Commercialization Council; Managing Partner, Pluritas; Damon Matteo, CEO, Fulcrum Strategy; Robert P. Taylor, President, RPT Legal Strategies; Venture Advisor, New Enterprise Associates, Bruce Berman, Chairman, Center for IP Understanding; Publisher, IP CloseUp; Principal, Brody Berman Associates; Elvir Causevic, Managing Director, Houlihan Lokey Tech+IP Advisory, Art Monk, VP IP Transactions, TechInsights; Rob Sterne, Founding Director at Sterne, Kessler, Goldstein & Fox

Opening Panel

IP CloseUp publisher and editor, and Center for Intellectual Property Understanding Chairman, Bruce Berman, is moderating the opening panel at 2:00 pm: The business impact of IP uncertainty and negative attitudes. Panelists include:

  • Manny W. Schecter (IBM)
  • Phil Johnson (J&J)
  • Marshall Phelps (Center for IP Understanding)
  • Laurie Self (Qualcomm)
  • Bob Pavey (Morgenthaler Ventures)

“Our patent system may no longer be providing the protection and incentives necessary to entice investors and entrepreneurs to assume the enormous risks that inhere in the creation of many new technologies and new companies,” said Rob Aronoff, IIPCC U.S. Chapter Chair.

“In recent years patent reform initiative have resulted in significant unintended consequences, including a decline in the reliability of patents is contributing to a waning of entrepreneurial energy and a decline in the risk tolerance of American investors and entrepreneurs.

Profound Implications

“This shift has profound implications for the long-term U.S. economy, as China, Korea, Germany and other countries expand the role that patents play in their economies with ambitious plans to displace American dominance of technology in the years to come. This program will explore the direct and essential role that strong and enforceable ‘good patents’ play in allowing investors and entrepreneurs to justify the high levels of risk that drive innovation.”

Conference sponsors include Houlihan Lokey, TechInsights, Qualcomm and Pluritas.

Partners include IAM Magazine, the Licensing Executives Society, the Center for IP Understanding, USIJ Alliance for Startups & Inventors for Jobs and IP CloseUp.

For more information, go here.

Those interested in attending can request and invitation, availability permitting, by emailing rob.aronoff@iipcc.org.

Image source: iipcc.org; west-windsor-plainsboro.k12.nj.edu

 

 

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Three notable IP events coming up in NY, SF and Bangalore

March 13, 2017 by Bruce Berman 0 Comments

IP event season is upon us and at least three conferences are worth noting. 

The first takes place this week in New York, March 21-22, the 9th annual Corporate IP Counsel Forum. The USPTO Keynote will be given by Mary Boney Denison, Commissioner for Trademarks and Mark Powell, Deputy Commissioner for International Patent Cooperation.

The featured session will be “Reconsidering Patent-Eligibility under Section 101.” Speaker faculty can be found here and the conference agenda here. I understand that there are only a few seats left.

IP CloseUp readers can save $200 by using registration code IPCNYC.

*****

The World IP Forum will take place this year April 26-28 at the Shangri-La Hotel in Bengaluru (Bangalore), India.  The theme for the conference is “Harnessing the Power of Intellectual Property.” The fourth edition of this three-day conference will focus on recent developments in intellectual property and its syncing with business objectives. Past participants have include Judge Randall Rader and former USPTO Commissioner Q. Todd Dickinson.

For more information about the World IP Forum, go here.

*****

On May 18 San Francisco’s Golden Gate Club (at the Presidio) will be the site for IAM’s IP Software Summit.  The Summit is the first event to provide a platform for professionals from the software industry to discuss open innovation, open source and proprietary systems, collaboration, the scope of patent protection, and monetization.

The list of speakers can be found here and the full agenda here.

Speakers include senior IP executives from Cisco, Qualcomm, Mozilla, SAP, Open Invention Network, Google, Uber, LinkedIn, Ericsson and IBM.

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