Chairman Bob Goodlatte Introduces New Anti-Patent Trolling Bill

Last Wednesday, House Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) introduced his long awaited bipartisan bill, the Innovation Act, designed to curb the growing threat from patent assertion entities (PAEs), also called patent trolls. This bill contains a number of mechanisms to undermine the schemes by which patent trolls operate, including: heightened pleading standards in complaints, transparency about those with financial interests in the patent, cost-shifting mechanisms that can allow a court to mandate that the loser pays both side’s litigation fees, stays of patent suits involving end users until suits against manufacturers have been resolved, and expanded post-grant review authority of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Chairman Goodlatte will convene a hearing of the House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, October 29, 2013 at 10 AM to discuss the Innovation Act. Additionally, Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT) of the Senate Judiciary Committee expressed his support of Chairman Goodlatte’s bill and has said he will continue to work on the issue in the Senate. More information about this issue is available in a recent blog post on our Regulatory Rumblings blog.