INVENTORS REQUEST CORRECTION TO COVER OF 10 MILLIONTH PATENT

Via press release from US Inventor today:

INVENTORS REQUEST CORRECTION TO COVER OF 10 MILLIONTH PATENT

(WASHINGTON, DC) – Today the United States Patent and Trademark Office announced issuance of the 10 millionth patent. But inventors complain that the language on the face of the new patent design is legally incorrect. They say the patent includes a false promise – that the patent grants to inventors “having title to this patent the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, or selling the invention.”

In a petition filed under the Administrative Procedures Act, they remind new USPTO Director Andrei Iancu of the 2006 Supreme Court decision in Ebay which eliminated the right to injunctive relief for patent holding inventors. This error was further highlighted by the recent Supreme Court decision Oil States which held that patents are not property rights with the right to exclude, but are instead “public franchise rights” like the right to erect a toll bridge, which can be given or taken at the pleasure of the federal agency, without a judge or jury. The petition goes on to ask the Director to correct the wording so that inventors are no longer misled into believing that their U.S. patent provides an exclusive right to their invention.

“I hope that Director Iancu will continue to lead the USPTO to increase the reliability of the patent grant, first and foremost by being truthful,” US Inventor President and petition signatory Randy Landreneau said. “The Supreme Court has said that a patent is not a right to exclude. Until Congress restores to inventors the right to injunctive relief, the words on the patent, while being in agreement with the US Constitution, are legally incorrect.”

The petition is also signed by Gary Stecklein (Inventor and President of Inventor’s Association of South Central Kansas), Stephen Lyon (Inventor and President of Inventor’s Network of Minnesota), Adrian Pelkus (Inventor and President of San Diego Inventors Forum), Tom Woolston (Inventor from Virginia and CEO of MercExchange), Joachim Martillo (Inventor and Patent Agent from Massachusetts), Josh Malone (Inventor from Texas), and Paul Morinville (Inventor from Indiana).

The petition is posted at http://www.usinventor.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Patent-Text-Correction-Rulemaking-Petition.pdf.