Making the Case for the Benefits of Uniformity and Predictability
Uniformity and predictability are often lacking from judicial treatment of cases involving vicarious liability claims against franchisors, yet uniformity and predictability are the hallmarks of a successful franchise system, and the engines that have driven franchising to occupy such a prominent position in the domestic and worldwide economy.
Offshore Outsourcing: Trends and Issues
It's no longer sneaking up on anyone that outsourcing is not only here to stay, but on the rise. A key part in outsourcing ' whether it's help desk or other IT functions or more involved business operations ' is the transfer and/or licensing of intellectual property and technology. This two-part article looks at outsourcing growth and trends, laws and taxes outsourcers need to know, and special considerations involved in transferring IP. Part One provides a fascinating glimpse where outsourcing is headed and why, the different business models outsourcing companies use, and discusses how outsourcers can maintain quality control over the outsourced functions.
Ethereal Asset
In the past 10 years intellectual property lawyers have become the profession's "it" boys and girls, if not quite rock stars. Law firms want to acquire them and are willing to pay them handsomely. Law students see IP as their meal ticket. And, most importantly, corporations want to retain them, as executives have begun to realize that ' in the words of Federal Reserve Board chairman Alan Greenspan ' "the economic product of the United States has become predominantly conceptual." <br>Intellectual property law is the container that creates value for Greenspan's conceptual assets ' stuff like biotechnology discoveries and circuitry design that is hard to create but comparatively easy to duplicate. IP lawyers are the enforcers of this peculiar brand of law, and frequently they are also the managers of this peculiar brand of asset. IP lawyers are in the catbird seat ' highly desirable free agents as firms chase talent, and highly sought-after corporate counselors. Can the good times last forever?
Redmond Turns Blue
It has to be the greatest licensing story ever told. In 1980, IBM Corporation needed an operating system to launch a line of personal computers, and its executives thought Microsoft Corporation had built one. Wrong. Twenty-five-year-old Bill Gates and company didn't have what IBM sought, but they wanted to please IBM. So, in a fit of business genius, they figured out a way to make IBM happy and themselves wealthy. For $50,000, Microsoft bought the complete rights to a rudimentary operating system called QDOS from an outfit called Seattle Computer Products and then agreed to license it to IBM ' and anybody else ' for about $50 a computer. <br>Last June, Gates named 28-year IBM veteran Marshall Phelps corporate vice president and deputy general counsel for intellectual property. Six months later, Microsoft announced that Phelps ' who retired from his post as vice president for intellectual property and licensing at IBM in 2000 and had been doing consulting work ' would be heading up Microsoft's new intellectual property licensing initiative.
Patent Liaisons and IP Strategy Development
Many technically intensive companies utilize patent liaisons to augment their intellectual property (IP) work. Patent liaisons work with patent attorneys and inventors and can have a wide variety of job responsibilities, thereby helping to provide additional trained "legal" resources to a business in a very economical manner.
Chickens First or Eggs: Pre-filing Commercialization Efforts
Is it the chicken or the egg? Your client InventCo thinks it has several great new products, but it needs money to bring the products to the U.S. marketplace. Tooling costs money, as does producing sufficient inventory, and don't even mention what needs to be put aside to pay the patent attorney ' all for products that might flop in the market. "You've got to spend money to make money," InventCo's president says. "Too bad I can't offer them for sale now and see if any of them actually sell before I start the patenting process, but I remember what you told me about 1-year on-sale bars and what happed to that Pfaff guy," he continues. "Hold on a minute," you tell him, "there's a way around <i>Pfaff</i>."
Nanotechnology Patents: Will Small-Scale Science Pose Big Challenges for Applicants and the Patent Office?
The term "nanotechnology" generally refers to the fabrication and manipulation of materials and devices on the scale of about 1-100 nanometers, and has become one of the key technology buzzwords for 2004. The passage of the 21st Century Nanotechnology Research and Development Act, Pub. L. No. 108-153, which authorized $3.7 billion in federal funding from 2005 through 2008 for the support of nanotechnology research and development, has fueled the fervor over nanotechnology. This substantial funding came as the scientific community and industries as diverse as cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, and petrochemicals were increasingly discovering that, when reduced to nanoscale size, ordinary bits of matter often manifest radically different physical properties. <i>See</i> Joseph Brean, <i>The Next Big (Little) Thing,</i> National Post (Feb. 6, 2004).
The Third (and Best) Way to Use the PCT: Why the Patent Cooperation Treaty Makes U.S. Prosecution Better
If you asked 100 patent attorneys walking down the street, "What is the PCT for?", the vast majority would answer that the PCT is used to file a U.S. patent application under the Paris Convention to reserve patent rights in many other countries. A minority of them might reply (particularly if they were on a street in New York or Washington), that the PCT is the way their foreign clients bring their own applications into the United States. But very few would answer, "to control the timing and location of my search and the timing and location of my examination for my U.S. patent application."
