George Mason University Antonin Scalia Law School

Supreme Court Should Not Reward Efficient Infringement in Apple v. Samsung

Supreme Court Building, Washington, D.C.In Apple v. Samsung, the Supreme Court is presented with a classic issue of statutory interpretation in the case that has come to exemplify the Smart Phone Wars. In one of the many lawsuits brought by Apple against Samsung after Samsung rejected Apple’s offer to license its patents, a jury found Samsung liable for infringing Apple’s design patents on the iPhone. Read more

It’s Time to Say “No” to Junk Science in the Patent Policy Debates

Last March, forty economists and law professors submitted a letter to Congress expressing “deep concerns with the many flawed, unreliable, or incomplete studies about the American patent system that have been provided to members of Congress.”  These concerns were confirmed again last week when Unified Patents released a report on patent litigation with the same kind of “highly exaggerated claims regarding patent trolls” that the professors were concerned about. Read more

Tesla’s New Patent Policy: Long Live the Patent System!

Last Thursday, Elon Musk, the founder and CEO of Tesla Motors, issued an announcement on the company’s blog with a catchy title: “All Our Patent Are Belong to You.” Commentary in social media and on blogs, as well as in traditional newspapers, jumped to the conclusion that Tesla is abandoning its patents and making them “freely” available to the public for whomever wants to use them. Read more

Demand Letters and Mandatory Disclosures: First Amendment Concerns

In the recent calls to revise the patent system to address so-called “patent trolls” — an ill-defined term that effectively derails any discussion of patent policy based in reality — Congress is considering bills that would impose mandatory disclosures on all demand letters sent by patent owners. Read more

A Historical Perspective of Patent Litigation: Continued Innovation & Recurrent Controversy

In her forthcoming George Mason University Law Review article, “Trolls and Other Patent Inventions: Economic History and the Patent Controversy in the Twenty-First Century,” Professor B. Zorina Khan sheds light on today’s hot-button patent issues and controversies through a detailed exploration of concerns surrounding our patent system throughout its two hundred and twenty-four year evolution into what is today “the most effective economic engine known to man.”  Read more

The History of Patent Licensing and Secondary Markets in Patents: An Antidote to False Rhetoric

The patent licensing business model is a flashpoint of controversy in the patent policy debates. Individuals and firms that specialize in licensing patented innovation – and companies that purchase patents in order to license them – have come under attack by the President, members of Congress, companies, lobbying groups, and others. Read more

The Nadir of “Patent Troll” Rhetoric

The venerable high-tech company IBM is no more a “patent troll” than any other legitimate company that engages in patent licensing. Yet, according to the very arguments of those who are using this ill-defined and misleading term, the shoe fits. Read more

GAO Report Confirms No “Patent Troll” Litigation Problem

As we previously reported, there are serious concerns with the studies asserting that a “patent litigation explosion” has been caused by patent licensing companies (so-called non-practicing entities (“NPEs”) or “patent trolls”). These seemingly alarming studies (see here and here) have drawn scholarly criticism for their use of proprietary, secret data collected from companies like RPX and Patent Freedom – companies whose business models are predicated on defending against patent licensing companies. Read more

A Brief History of Software Patents (and Why They’re Valid)

a green screen with binary and figuresToday, there is significant public debate over patents on the digital processes and machines that comprise computer software programs. These are often referred to as “software patents,” but this is an odd moniker. Aside from the similarly mislabeled debate over “DNA patents,” nowhere else in the patent system do we refer to patents on machines or processes in a specific technological field in this way; for instance, people do not talk about “automobile brake patents” or “sex toy patents” as their own category of patents deserving of approval or scorn.  Read more

Teleforum Panel on End-User Lawsuits in Patent Law on August 29 (free and open to the public)

End-User Lawsuits in Patent Litigation: A Bug or a Feature of Patent Law?
A Teleforum Panel
(Free and Open to the Public)

Thursday, August 29, 2013
Noon – 1pm (EST)

In the patent policy debates today, one issue that has proven a flash point of controversy is patent infringement lawsuits against consumers and retailers, such as coffee shops, JC Penney, and others.  Read more