Competitive and Technical Intelligence ToolBox

IBM researchers, including a team from IBM India Research Labs (IBM IRL), have developed a tool — Patent Quality Index — to address the issue of low-quality patents. Using the company’s advanced statistical and data analytics expertise, IBM has created a tool to assist patent applicants, examiners and the public to objectively assess the quality of patent applications and issued patents. Guruduth Banavar, director of IBM India Research Laboratory, told FC that a quantitative or mathematical way of evaluating patent applications was needed. “This tool can compare the user’s report with all existing applications and give an analysis of its quality,” he said. Currently, the undertaking is at a prototype stage and being tried in multiple studies. In recent years, low-quality patents — those with uncertain scope or dubious claims to scientific progress or technological innovation — has increased substantially, together with historic backlogs, creating uncertainty around intellectual propert...

All pending patent and trademark cases, on which final hearing has been held, are set to be disposed of by the end of March this year, as the patent office has set the month as a deadline for the clearance of such cases. In a move to expedite the patent and trademarks granting process, the Controller General of Patents, Designs and Trademarks (CGPDT) has fixed March 31 as the last date to liquidate backlog of pending cases. “From April 1, 2009, there shall not be any cases pending for orders for more than three months on post grant cases and month in cases of pre-grant cases after the final hearing,'' Controller General of Patents Designs and Trademarks Mr P H Kurian has sa id in a circular to all concerned authorities. Source

Scottish mobile technology firm Picsel is suing Apple ( NSDQ: AAPL ) over claims the iPhone and iPod touch use a key element of Picsel's patented "rapid redraw" mobile screen navigation technology. The suit (via the Reg), filed at the US District Court for Delaware, claims that the devices use the rendering technology which prevents long delays while zooming and panning through web pages and documents. The suit alleges Apple is making, selling and distributing phones that infringe on US patent 7,009,626 (also via the Reg) and in the suit Picsel claim to have invested "millions of dollars" in the contested technology. Picsel claims its mobile systems have been implemented?legally?into more than 250 million devices worldwide . Source

As of 1 July 2008, patents first filed in Italy will undergo prior art searches and substantive examination . The Italian Ministry of Economic Development recently issued a Decree confirming their agreement with the European Patent Office (EPO) regarding the change of process. Previously national patents filed in Italy did not undergo substantive examination and were presume valid. Assessments of patentability was deferred to nullity lawsuits or determined extra-judicially between the parties. A copy of the Decree can be found on the website of Italian Patent and Trademark Office (IPTO) ( in Italian )