Under a 1999 Amendment to its Patents Act, India is required to open the “mail box” today and refer the patent applications contained within for examination.

The “mail box” was created as a temporary holding cell for patent applications in the fields of pharmaceuticals and agricultural chemicals. Patent protection in these fields has not been historically available in India, and is required to be available tomorrow, January 1, 2005.

So, the “mail box” opens today and the applications are referred to Examiners for examination under the provisions of the new Act, which, to be TRIPs compliant, must include pharmaceuticals and chemicals as patentable subject matter.

But, what if India has not yet amended its Patents Act to extend patentability to these fields? (It hasn’t) Good question.

It is estimated that there are about 5000 applications in the “mail box.”

See this prior PTP post for more information.

The intellectual property community is blessed to have several high quality blogs to read that are focused on this area of law. Dennis Kennedy recently named the intellectual property blogs, collectively, as the Best Legal Blog Sector in his first, and hopefully annual, Legal Blogging Awards (affectionately nicknamed the “Blawggies” by Dennis).

Interested in reading all of the top IP blogs every day but not sure how to get started? Want a gimme New Year’s resolution that will reward you many times over? Follow the steps below, and in less than five minutes you’ll be set up to read the top blogs in this award-winning sector of the blogosphere.

1. Download and install a news reader/aggregator. Make sure the program can import OPML files. I use and recommend FeedDemon from Bradbury Software.

2. Download this OPML file (save target as…). Make sure you preserve the .opml file extension (your browser may want to save it as a pure .xml file — change this in the “save as…” dialog).

NOTE: As an alternative to downloading this file, you can simply point your reader/aggregator to the following URL during the importation process: http://www.promotetheprogress.com/ptpfiles/IPBlogs.opml

3. Import the OPML file into your reader/aggregator. In FeedDemon, choose File | Import OPML File…. Follow the importation instructions for your software. You’ll either need to navigate to the downloaded file, or enter the URL above.

4. Begin reading.

Welcome to IP Blawging!

As promised, the US Patent and Trademark Office has made the latest version of its EFS software available for download. The new version corrects a problem of the old — it didn’t recognize the new fee structure and only allowed for payment of the old fees on filing.

Because of this fix, the new version is now the only version that can be used to file electronically.

From the Office’s Electronic Business Center:

Download Required as of 23DEC2004: Submissions after 1:00 AM on 23 December 2004 will require that the user install and use an updated version of EFS software. Users wishing to make submissions via EFS must install and use ABX v1.2, EFS-ABX PDF Writer and ePAVE 5.2, available from the EFS Downloads page.

Users must download and install three separate programs: ABX, ABXPDF, and ePAVE.

India must amend its patent law to be fully TRIPs compliant by January 1, 2005. Considering India’s prior performance on TRIPs related deadlines (one prior deadline was missed by a mere 4 years), doubt on whether the required changes to the law will be in place by the new year are beginning to mount.

This article summarizes some of the politics that are behind the process.

“Considering that there has been no sign of the Bill even in the current session of Parliament, it has come right down to the wire. With every passing day, the only option that seems to be left with the government is to promulgate an ordinance by this month-end. Or run the risk of sanctions from developed countries and WTO.

UPDATE 1-1-05: The ordinance option came to fruition. A presidential decree has been issued to meet the deadline. But, the decree still must be approved by parliament. So, the political discussion/debate on the scope of patent protection has been delayed, likely until February of this year.

See this post for more information.

The legal inquiry of whether software and “computer implemented inventions” should be patentable subject matter is fascinating (at least to me). But, in the continuing saga of software patents in Europe, the patentability question is quickly being eclipsed by the process by which the European Union is considering the measure.

The Agricultural and Fisheries Commission is expected to rubber stamp the Directive on the patentability of computer-implemented inventions today, sending the measure back to Parliament.

The Fisheries Commission? Sounds like politically motivated agenda-setting.

Ah, but it gets better. Apparently it is possible that the Commission might not use its rubber stamp because of one member’s act of defiance in a bow to party loyalty.

The politics of this process are beginning to overshadow the substance of the draft Directive.

UPDATE: Axel Horn is reporting that the Directive has been removed from the agenda of today’s meeting.

China is in the midst of a complete overhaul of its intellectual property laws. According to this article, many beleive the reforms have little practical effect because the police and courts aren’t prepared to handle, or even identify, violations of intellectual property rights.

But, alas, these areas of the law are being reformed as well. Today, the Chinese High Court issued a series of measures designed to facilitate identification and punishment of intellectual property crimes.

At what point do these reforms become sufficient to convince people that China is serious about intellectual property?

A slight diversion from intellectual property law…

I have GMail invites to give away. Five invites. First five readers to e-mail me.

“The bottom line is this: there should be no question that the U.S. patent system produces high quality patents. Since questions have been raised about whether this is the case, the responsibility of Congress is to take a close look at the functioning of the patent system. Patent quality is key to continued innovation. Thus, we must act during the 109th Congress to assure the highest level of patent quality.”

With those words, Representative Howard Berman introduced the Patent Quality Assistance Act of 2004 (H.R. 5299) near the end of the 108th Congress. The PQAA includes several reform measures, including a post-grant opposition procedure and a system for submission of art by third parties on pending applications that have published. It also creates a rebuttable presumption of obviousness for business method patents in which the only novelty lies in the use of computer technology.

The PQAA includes other reform measures as well. A full review is forthcoming.

Representative Berman intends the PQA Act, or other similar measure, be enacted by the 109th Congress:

“…[W]e introduce this bill at the end of this Congress with the intent of framing the debate going into the 109th Congress, and with every intention of passing legislation in the next two years.”

Representative Berman’s comments on the introduction of the PQAA, the source of the quotes, are available here.

The United States Patent and Trademark Office is expected to release, later today, its report on the inter partes reexamination procedure created by the American Inventors Protection Act (AIPA). The AIPA requires the Patent Office to report to Congress an evaluation of the inter partes reexamination procedure within 5 years of the enactment of the AIPA, which was signed into law on November 29, 1999.

A draft of the report, courtesy of Hal Wegner, is available here.

The report reflects suprise on the part of the Patent Office that anticipated numbers of filings under the new procedures have not been met. Importantly, the report considers the reasons for the limited use of the procedures and makes recommendations for statutory changes to improve the procedure. Perhaps most significantly, the report highlights the need for statutory change that clarifies the estoppel provisions of the inter partes reexamination system.

Perhaps most interesting, though, is the discussion regarding the post grant review procedures proposed in the Patent Office’s 21st Century Strategic Plan. The report states that “the proposed Post-Grant Review would provide a review model that is more comprehensive than, and different from, reexamination. Specifically, Post-Grant Review would provide a genuinely contested case presided over by panels of USPTO administrative judges.” (emphasis added)

The report offers Congress the suggestions of the Patent Office for improvement of the existing inter partes reexamination procedure, but it also makes it clear that the Office sees this procedure as a single component of a comprehensive post-grant review system.

Interestingly, the Patent Quality Assistance Act of 2004 (108 H.R. 5299) was introduced at the end of the 108th Congress, with a promise by a sponsor of the bill that it will be considered in the upcoming 109th. The bill includes an opposition procedure.

UPDATE: The Patent Office made the final version of the report publicly available later in the day.

Today, while filing a provisional application using the electronic filing system, I discovered that the ePAVE software does not reflect the new fees made effective on December 8, 2004. Not a big deal, since you can (and I did) ‘check the box’ to authorize any additional necessary fees.

The Patent Office has announced that new version 5.2 of ePAVE will be available on December 23, 2004. The new version will include the new fee structure, and the Office warns:

“Once ePAVE version 5.2 is available for download from the USPTO web site, eFilers will be able and required to submit the appropriate fees associated with their eFiling. If eFilers then attempt to use ePAVE version 5.1(e) they will receive a Version Synco Error message from the USPTO and the eFiler will not be allowed to continue with their eFiling until the proper version of the software has been installed.”

So, eFilers must download the new software to continue efiling after December 23. And you thought you were leaving the office early on Christmas eve….

The Consolidated Appropriations Act for 2005 continues to expand its reach….