The following is a blog post by Varun Shah, Aruba Network’s Director, Intellectual Property — full disclosure, I previously represented Aruba. Shah has an interesting alternative patent reform proposal that seeks to target the patent troll problem. It is interesting because it is under-inclusive. On the one hand, that is less than ideal because it does not cover all trolls (or at least all entities that are arguably trolls). On the other hand, it is intriguing because by being under-inclusive it minimizes the impact of the legislation outside of the troll world, which may make it easier to get it a vote in both houses of Congress. Additionally, while Shah’s discussion focuses largely upon creating a heightened pleading requirement for a subset of patent troll cases, using the same definition of a potential troll, other requirements could be added to the legislation, for example fee awards or discovery limitations, as Shah notes. So, while Shah’s proposal is not perfect, it is an interesting proposal and is, at a minimum, positive in that it is creating new discussion around patent reform.
With that, here are Shah’s thoughts:
The Innovation Act was a great attempt at reducing the patent troll problem for the Information Technology industry. For example, the Innovation Act proposed regulating patent litigation practice by increasing pleading standards, placing limitations on patent discovery, and providing cost-shifting mechanisms. However, the Innovation Act is now stalled in Congress, in part, due to the rejection by the Pharmaceutical and Biotech industries of the new proposed regulations such as the limitations on discovery. A solution is needed that reduces the patent troll problem for the Information Technology industry while balancing the needs of the Pharmaceutical and Biotech industries.
I propose modifying the Innovation Act to limit discovery only if the current patent owner is not one of:
- The inventor
- The assignee, including subsidiaries and parent companies thereof, to whom the inventor was obligated to assign to at the time of filing an application for the patent
- An acquiring entity that acquired the patent in a sale of an established line of business originated by (a) or (b), the sale including all trademarks, copyrights, and patents related to the established line of business.
Additional criteria for qualifying as a sale of an established line of business (such as a minimum annual revenue for the established line of business) may be needed in order to ensure that patents are not held in shell entities for selling of patents to third parties and designing around this proposal.
Similar to the limited discovery example above, other sections of the Innovation Act may be considered for modification such that the rights and requirements related to patent assertion activities depend on whether or not the current patent owner is one of (a), (b), or (c) identified above.
This proposal reduces the patent troll problem for the Information Technology industry without reducing the patent assertion rights for the original patent Applicant. More generally, this proposal will protect the interests of all innovators that actually generate the ideas/patents while partially diluting the value of the patents if commoditized and transferred to others that are abusing and burdening the patent system. This re-structuring of patent value is in-line with the true goals of the patent system, i.e., the promotion of innovation.
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Mr. Shah is actively discussing the proposal with bill writers in Representative Goodlatte’s office to modify the Innovation Act. If you are in support of the proposal, Mr. Shah suggests contacting the key policymakers: Representative Goodlatte, Senator Reid, Senator Leahy, Senator Cornyn, Senator Schumer, and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP).