Hopes for patent reform appear all but dead. On Wednesday, Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, took the patent-reform bill off the committee's agenda—citing the inability of organizations on both sides of the issue to come to an agreement.
“We have been working for almost a year with countless stakeholders on legislation to address the problem of patent trolls who are misusing the patent system,” Leahy said. “This is a real problem facing businesses in Vermont and across the country.”
He continued, “Unfortunately, there has been no agreement on how to combat the scourge of patent trolls on our economy without burdening the companies and universities who rely on the patent system every day to protect their inventions. We have heard repeated concerns that the House-passed bill went beyond the scope of addressing patent trolls, and would have severe unintended consequences on legitimate patent holders who employ thousands of Americans.”
He concluded, “If the stakeholders are able to reach a more targeted agreement that focuses on the problem of patent trolls, there will be a path for passage this year, and I will bring it immediately to the Committee. We can all agree that patent trolls abuse the current patent system. I hope we are able to return to this issue this year.”
Senator Chuck Grassley, Ranking Member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said, “I am surprised and disappointed that the Senate Democrat leadership is not willing to move forward on a bill that we've worked on so hard and were ready and expecting to mark up tomorrow. We put in a good faith effort to get to this point, and it's too bad that the bill is being pulled from the agenda.”
Politico quoted Michael Beckerman, president of The Internet Association, which represents Google, Facebook and other Web firms, as saying, “Stakeholders that range from Internet companies to retailers to hospitals to restaurants, we’ve all compromised; we’ve all been at the table, trying to be helpful to negotiators. There are a handful of companies, and the patent trolls themselves, that oppose any kind of reform,” who have worked to slow the process.
Indeed, tech companies themselves have taken different positions on the issue, as described in an earlier post.
Dustin Volz in National Journal cited fee-shifting, which in certain circumstances would require losers in patent infringement cases to pay winners' legal fees, as a key sticking point. “Republicans generally favor a strong fee-shifting provision, but Democrats, who typically earn support from trial lawyers fearful of anything that sounds like tort reform, are less supportive,” he wrote.