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The Great Patent Race |
 You
might have read about the recent U.S. Patent and Trademark Office
(USPTO) law that changes policy from a
'first to invent' to a 'first to file' system. It was meant to reduce
the amount of work required by patent examiners and to reduce litigation
by eliminating the heretofore potentially subjective nature of determining
who was the 'real' inventor of an idea. Previously, if a person could
prove via formal dated notes, witnesses, etc., that he was the first
to manifest an idea in the form of a working model, there was a good
chance that an existing patent could be reassigned. Now, it is almost
purely a matter of who gets the earliest timestamp for having been received
at the USPTO. This short piece in Inc magazine discusses the new
patent filing issue.
Posted June 2013 |
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