America’s patent system has always been based on the first-to-invent principle, meaning whoever creates something new gets the right to sell it and profit from their work. Now, Congress is seriously considering replacing this historical system with a first-to-file one that favors not the inventor, but anyone with money.

 

Pushing this dramatic change are corporations like Intel, GE, Dell, Motorola and GlaxoSmithKline, who argue that a first-to-file system will reduce litigation over who should own the patent on new inventions.

 

The proposal cleared the Senate 95-5, but now faces a tough fight in the House, where a diverse coalition ranging from small inventors to Silicon Valley entrepreneurs to The American Conservative Union and the Gun Owners of America are working to defeat the legislation.

-Noel Brinkerhoff

 

A Patent Failure (by Sandy Rios, Daily Caller)

Advancing Patent-Reform Bill Making Some Strange Bedfellows (by Ashby Jones, Wall Street Journal)