http://canadapatentblog.com International Patent Matters from a Canadian Patent Lawyer's Perspective Tue, 17 Aug 2010 16:11:02 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Hershkovitz v. Tyco Safety Products Canada Ltd Canadian Federal Court of Appeal Sometimes decisions are made by the courts that make you angry. And other times they just make you sad. This is a case that falls into both categories: Hershkovitz v. Tyco Safety Products Canada Ltd. 2010 FCA 190 Date: July ... http://canadapatentblog.com/?p=59                                         Patenting Software in Canada While the world waits for the US Supreme Court decision in the Bilski case, the Canadian Patent Office is going forward with establishing its policies as to when patents can be granted for software inventions in Canada. They have done so by publishing a draft revision ... http://canadapatentblog.com/?p=58  US Law Reform: Prefiling Protection for Inventors under revised S515   The Canadapatentblog postings of November 16, 2009 and January 31, 2010 addressed the scope of the draft novelty requirements under US Senate bill S515 as originally approved by the US Senate Judiciary Committee in April, 2009.  A proposed revision of that ... http://canadapatentblog.com/?p=57 Patent law reform legislation, for the third time, is presently pending before the US Congress. During 2009 the debate over Health Care has moved this subject to the back burner. But in the last days of 2009, initiatives are now being taken by proponents to save the old first-to-invent patentability ... http://canadapatentblog.com/?p=55 Dennis Crouch, as part of his Patently O blog is circulating a survey that addresses the first-to-invent/first-to-file patentability requirements. He is doing so in conjunction with a larger survey addressing the extent to which applicants are able to swear-back of prior disclosures published in the one-year grace period before their ... http://canadapatentblog.com/?p=54                                     The Crisis in the American Patent System                                                                           Part I   This first section is part of a multi-part paper addressing the challenges presented by the American patent system.  The first part is historical.  The second part, to follow, addresses proposals pending before Congress in 2009 to improve the operation of the ... http://canadapatentblog.com/?p=51 Throughout my career as a professional engineer working as a patent attorney I have repeatedly been trying to appeciate why people do not understand what patents are all about. Almost invariably, everyone who has approached me to discuss patenting has arrived with preconceived notions about the subject. I have spent a ... http://canadapatentblog.com/?p=45 Gregory A. Stobbs in his 2001 book "Business Method Patents" describes how the classic corporate invention harvesting mechanism, based on filtering concepts presented by workers at the bottom of the corporation, can yield a sizeable patent portfolio in terms of numbers.   But, Stobbs warns, the results often lack focus.  Stobbs ... http://canadapatentblog.com/?p=43   As a lawyer with an engineering degree certified as a registered Canadian patent agent, I have on occasion been approached by persons to ask whether they should pursue a career in law, patent agency or both. These are my thoughts on such issue. I went on from engineering to take ... http://canadapatentblog.com/?p=41 Every attorney practicing patent law has experienced the difficulty of explaining to clients the principles of patent law. This exercise is particularly challenging when the client, subjectively, has made a substantial advance which the attorney feels is not likely to support the grant of a patent. Typically, when interviewed, the inventor ... http://canadapatentblog.com/?p=39