April 2012
(Thanks to Dave Zedonis for reporting this presentation.) Mr. Cedric D’Hue (patent attorney with Bingham Greenebaum Doll LLP; 317-635-8900; cdhue@bgdlegal.com ) discussed the recently passed America Invents Act . The Act is a step toward creating a single worldwide system of patent law that would simplify and decrease the cost of getting and enforcing a patent. Among other things, the Act specifies a new requirement for getting a patent from the United States government. Now, a patent is awarded, by the U.S. to the first inventor of an invention who within a reasonable time applies for a patent, and by almost all other countries to the inventor of an invention who first applies for a patent. The U.S. now awards a patent to an inventor who is the first to document imagining the invention and who diligently embodies the invention, either as a working model or as a patent application that alleges that the invention works as intended. As of March 2013, the U.S. will join al