It’s been just over a year since IBM, in partnership with the New York Law School, unveiled the first-of-a-kind Peer to Patent community patent review process. Now, the idea is taking on worldwide momentum.
In June 2007, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) kicked off a one-year pilot of the Peer to Patent program. The program is premised on the idea of using expert volunteers from the private sector to help give specific feedback to patent examiners, who are tasked with determining the novelty and technical innovation of a proposed invention.
Peer to Patent
Some of the highlights of the USPTO first year pilot include:
- 206,000 Web page views from 36,000 unique visitors in 129 countries.
- 1,800 visitors registered to become reviewers.
- 145 prior art references cited, two of which led to patent application rejections.
- 92% of patent examiners surveyed said they would welcome examining another application with public participation.
Examiners have to contend with an increasing backlog of ever-more complex and esoteric patent filings, and, until the pilot program, could not really solicit detailed advice from outside experts — relying only on a finite number of fellow examiners and voluminous databases
The Peer to Patent program uses a secure Web site to make a selected number of patents open and available to volunteer reviewers, and gives them tools to collaborate with other experts to find prior art and share that information with the USPTO. IBM subject-matter experts have been busy reviewing patents submitted to the program, and have had a selected number of their patents reviewed by peers in the industry.
The ultimate goal of the program is to improve overall patent quality -- by increasing visibility and leveraging the collective wisdom of experts in the community, examiners are better assured of granting a patent only for a truly novel invention.
A global revolution
The initial USPTO pilot was limited to software patent application, but it was announced recently that the agency is extending the pilot to June 15, 2009, and expanding upon the types of patents that will be reviewed. The results of the first year’s pilot were recently published by the New York Law School.
On the same day as the USPTO announcement, the Japan Institute of Intellectual Property (IIP) and the Japan Patent Office (JPO) announced that they were kicking off a Japanese version of the Community Patent Review program.
Inspired by the success of the USPTO pilot, JPO plans to run the pilot thru March of 2009 and hopes to have 200-400 registered participants.
Meanwhile, the United Kingdom is making final preparations to announce the commencement of their own program. The Patents Directorate of the UK Intellectual Property Office has confirmed that they are tying up the final details and hope to launch their own community patent review program in the coming months.
"Many of our technical professionals have voluntarily signed up as peer reviewers and IBM stands out as a leading contributor of prior art," says John E. Kelly III, senior vice president and director of IBM Research. "I am tremendously proud of that accomplishment I know we can do even better now that the pilot is being expanded and I encourage our inventor community to participate. Not only will it help us do our jobs better by bringing additional focus and awareness to the marketplace, it will help with the imperative of improving patent quality."
At the center of policy initiatives
IBM has been the patent leader for the last 15 years and has been at the center of numerous policy and societal initiatives to increase patent quality and streamline the patenting process.
These include the first-ever corporate patent policy, which mandates clarity, quality and transparency in IBM's participation in the patent process. IBM is also working with academics and experts around the world to construct the most useful and a comprehensive index to measure and assure patent quality.
Last updated August 1, 2008