PATENTS In/Sight
The UK Intellectual Property Office commissioned a report on the worldwide costs of delays in processing patent applications through to patents. The most interesting parts are the clearly articulated assumptions on which the report is based. For example, the report acknowledges that much of the value of a patent to its owner is during the application phase, when its final form is unknown [and the claims can be adjusted to read on what a competitor is doing-DGA] , and is even more intimidating to potential competitors than after it issues or is rejected. An attempt is made to estimate the economic cost of this extra monopoly power.
The consultants seem to feel that the additional power granted by the extra time pending discourages innovation and filing, when it is waves of new inventions and applications causing the backlogs!
The interesting part of patent policy is that it is an exercise in pushing a piece of string. Who knows if there really is an incentive to invent caused by granting patents? Who knows if the valuable inventions disclosed through filing applications would otherwise remain secret often enough to justify the cost of the patent system?
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