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Published: 2015-08-05

Total Pages: 228

ISBN-13: 9781332274437

Excerpt from Patent Term and Patent Disclosure Legislation: Hearing Before the Committee on Small Business, House of Representatives, One Hundred Fourth Congress, Second Session, Washington, DC, April 25, 1996 The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 11 a.m., in room 2359, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Jan Meyers (Chair of the Committee) presiding. Chair Meyers. Good morning. The Committee will come to order. I think we have several people who are on their way, so I will go ahead and get started with a couple of opening remarks and welcome everyone who is here. At the outset, I would like to thank all of our witnesses for being here today. Particularly, Ms. Gardner, who has traveled all the way from San Diego to be with us; a long, long journey. Today we will be discussing two patent issues of importance to small business: Patent terms and patent disclosure. As most of you are aware, there are two different legislative approaches currently pending which address these issues: H.R. 359, which was introduced by Mr. Rohrabacher of California; and H.R. 1733, which was introduced by Mr. Moorhead of California. I personally am a cosponsor of H.R. 359. However, I realize that my colleagues here on the Committee have different views on these issues. I wanted to make sure that we heard from both sides today. While these issues of patent term and patent disclosure were addressed recently in our deliberations leading to the passage of GATT implementing legislation in the last Congress, I believe that many Members were not aware of the full reach of what was contained in every nook and cranny of the GATT accord which emerged from the Uruguay Round. I am a supporter of H.R. 359 for a couple of reasons. First, I believe that the previous system of 17 years of patent protection from the date of grant is more conducive to promoting American innovation and protecting the rights of small business inventors. This particular approach worked quite well for over 130 years. Moreover, I am very concerned about the premature disclosure of intellectual property. Many small businesses work hard to develop new innovations only to lose the ways to market their products to their full potential because of the premature release of technical information. Publication should occur after grant. America has a long and unique tradition of protecting intellectual property. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.