By John Villasenor – The Leahy-Smith America Invents Act (AIA) approved in September 2011 constitutes the most significant overhaul of the American patent system in decades. The legislation was signed into law by President Obama on September 16, 2011.
The new law will move the United States away from a “first to invent” system and closer to the “first to file” approach used in much of the rest of the world. Other important changes include a new proceeding in the U .S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) for third-party challenges to the validity of a recently issued patent, an expanded mechanism for a third party to provide information to the PTO that could be used to narrow or eliminate claims in a pending patent application being prosecuted by a commercial rival, and the introduction of a new, broadly applicable patent infringement defense based on prior commercial use.
It will take many years to develop a mature body of case law and legal scholarship on the full impact of the AIA. What is clear today is that it will profoundly impact the ways that patents are filed, prosecuted, and litigated in the coming years. more> http://is.gd/oMRSU0
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- Sweeping patent changes poised to become law ↓
- Patent overhaul signed into law by Obama, Josh Lowensohn, CNET News
- Obama signs patent reform legislation, Darlene Superville, Associated Press/R&D Mag
- Defining Prior Art under the Leahy-Smith AIA, Howard Skaist and Ted Karr, Patently-O
- America Invents: Immediate Changes to Patent Law Start Today, Eldora L. Ellison, Ph.D. and Jeremiah B. Frueauf, IPWatchdog.com
- Innovating our System for Innovation, White House
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