Patent Reform Act of 2007 - Reactions and Lobbying

Reactions and Lobbying

• American Institute of Certified Public Accountants supported the provision banning patents on tax planning methods.
• Business Software Alliance indicated that it supported the bill because it provided "provisions to improve patent quality; ensure equitable and fair remedies for patent infringement; give the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office greater resources to process a growing number of complex patent applications; and harmonize the American system with those of other major patent-granting nations."
• Coalition for Patent Fairness which is a group of IT companies like Apple, Google, Intel, Microsoft, Cisco, Dell, HP, Micron, Oracle, and Symantec, favored limitations on damage for infringement.
• Electronic Frontier Foundation favored limitations on damage for infringement.
• The United States Department of Commerce opposed the bill "in its entirety" due to the provisions limiting damages for infringement and stated that if those sections were not revised, "the resulting harm to a reasonably well-functioning U.S. intellectual property system would outweigh all the bill's useful reforms." However the USDOC supported the bill's provisions directed to the improvement of patent quality, beginning at the application stage.
• AFLCIO, United Steel Workers, Change To Win Labor Federation, and other unions or groups that favor unions - including POPA, the union of US patent examiners - lobbied against the bill, characterizing it as weakening the rights of patent holders which would in turn stifle American innovation and contribute to the outsourcing of U.S. jobs to other nations.
• Several conservative groups, including American Family Association, and Eagle Forum lobbied against the bill on the basis that it undermined "America’s historically strong intellectual property rights...for the benefit of one economic sector, large IT firms, to the detriment of almost every other industrial, service, and financial sector of the economy"
• The Biotechnology Industry Organization lobbied against the bill, since the biotechnology industry relies heavily on strong patent rights.
• Coalition for 21st Century Patent Reform, favored several provisions but opposed the bill that passed the House because of the damages section.
• IEEE, which represents engineers and the Innovation Alliance, which represents entrepreneurs, and the National Small Business Association opposed the Act because they viewed it as weakening the rights of inventors and small business.
• National Association of Patent Practitioners characterized the bill as containing an "anti-patent wish-list" and opposed it for weakening the patent system. They also noted that the bill would make it easier to challenge the validity of a patent on the basis of inequitable conduct, a point of concern for patent attorneys.
• Professional Inventors Alliance, PIAUSA.ORG