- Professor Lichtman has introduced a new IPColloquium podcast: A chat between the UCLA law professor and Chief Judge Rader. The podcast is setup to provide free CLE for many states. [Link]
- 10% discount for Patently-O readers at the IBC Legal Conference in London on “Standards & Patents.” Nov. 16–17, 2010. Discount Code: KW8099PTBG. [Link]
- Upcoming Hearings:
- Nov 8: Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in Costco v. Omega. The case involves the concept of copyright exhaustion in the international context. The decision will likely directly impact the parallel patent law doctrine.
- Nov 9: The Federal Circuit will hear en banc oral arguments on two cases: (1) Therasense v. BD (rethinking the law of inequitale conduct); and (2) TiVo v. EchoStar (post-judgment treatment of modified product-lines).
- Satellite Offices are currently under consideration at the USPTO. In some recent statements, Commerce Secretary Locke suggested that Detroit may a chosen spot. [Link] I contacted PTO officials who indicated that no final decisions had been made, but that some announcement may be forthcoming this calendar year. I expect that some cities are seriously lobbying at this point.
The great use of life is to spend it doing something that will outlast it
God expects answers for the flowers he sends us, not for the sun
the earth.
But not so sure about Detroit… though there’s probably a sizable amount of home-grown IP talent there.
I know Detroit area and it would be an excellent choice.
Another consideration is an advantage for the practitioners to visit a regional office. St. Louis, for example, is under an hour flight from Chicago, Indianapolis, KC, Memphis (anyone really enjoy flying in and out of O’Hare?). Flying into St. Louis for a morning interview and a practioner could be back in their office by afternoon. St. Louis also has a light rail system from the airport into downtown or into East St. Louis, IL. Politically, 4 U.S. Senators could be on board if established an office across the river from St. Louis and in Illinois. Other St.Louis area considerations: existing federal presence (Fed. Reserve, EDMO, Defense Mapping, Scott Air Force Base); low cost of living; manufacturing and bio hubs; four seasons; Cardinal baseball
I’m all for the idea of opening regional patent offices; I think it would be quite a logical move. But Detroit? Hmm… if the USPTO were to open satellite office in Southern California, I have little doubt that there would be an increase in the number of people suddenly interested in patent law, and staffing wouldn’t present much of a problem. But not so sure about Detroit… though there’s probably a sizable amount of home-grown IP talent there.
“Currently, many newly-minted examiners are being sent to work at home right after they finish their training, because the present USPTO office doesn’t have enough space for all of them.”
@john q. public – please don’t post if you don’t know anything. To work from home an examiner must be non-probationary (i.e. more than 2 years), a GS-12, and have passed the exam.
The closest major airport to Marshall, Texas is Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, about 150 miles from Marshall.
marshall, texas, has a low cost of living too.
detroit has a low cost of living and would be a good choice
Chicago and LA? Uh. I think the point of a satellite office would be to be in a low cost of living area, so people working there would be happy with the wage.
Put a satellite office somewhere in texas, or somewhere in the south (charlotte, atlanta, etc), where the wages an examiner makes would go a lot farther.
MOOOOOOO
that’s when she told me a story ’bout free milk and a cow
Two more satellite offices are all that’s needed:
One in Chicago.
One in Vegas, L.A., or San Fran.
Problem w/SF is the high cost of housing.
L.A. has lower housing costs in nice areas as close as 30 minute drives away.
Vegas could be excellent. Low housing costs. No state income tax. All you have to do is keep the kids away from all the evil, sin, and crime.
Detroit: Where the cost of dying’s only slightly more expensive than the cost of living.
Btw, 6, I caught your appearance at Blizzcon last week. Nice work!
link to youtube.com
For instance, Michigan ranks 6th in number of issued utility patents in 2009.
Which suggests that perhaps it should get the 6th satellite office, rather than the 1st?
Mind you, I don’t really care, I’m just trying to follow the logic.
Detroit is not as odd a choice as you may think. For instance, Michigan ranks 6th in number of issued utility patents in 2009.
“Detroit is a terrible choice. Somewhere on the west coast would make more sense.”
Let’s not forget that Mr. Locke was physically at a conference in Detroit when he said what he said. Even if Detroit and also some west coast locations were all being considered, which one do you think he’d be most likely to mention?
Let’s also not forget that the USPTO can have more than one satellite office. Yes, a west coast office, or at least an office in the western half of the U.S. that is accessible for west-coasters (Reno and Vegas were mentioned) would be a good idea. An office there AND an office in the midwest would be an even better idea.
Detroit is a terrible choice. Somewhere on the west coast would make more sense.
Let’s not forget that Mr. Locke was physically at a conference in Detroit when he said what he said. Even if Detroit and also some west coast locations were all being considered, which one do you think he’d be most likely to mention?
“Detroit is a candidate”, he said. Basil Marceauxdotcom was a candidate, too.
Detroit is a terrible choice. Somewhere on the west coast would make more sense.
will they be paid Detroit or DC/VA wages?
Salary for Examiners in DC and (hypothetically) Detroit would be exactly the same.
Examiners are on a special rate table that currently pays higher than the standard GS scale + cost of living increase. Examiners always would get the higher of the salary in our special rate table and the standard GS+COL.
Quote: will they be paid Detroit or DC/VA wages?
Examiners are already paid Detroit wages
Ha ha ha Detroit – the motor city
Flint, Ford, Auto, Mobile, Alabama,
windshield wipers Buffalo, New York, Gary, Indiana
Don’t forget the Motor City
This was supposed to be the new world
Maybe its because it is cost effective. A Patent Agent would still have to fly there, so they chose to pay the extra and live there instead. Tomatoe Tomato.
The fallacy of an inner-belt practicioner.
Okay then, tell me why there are so many patent agents in the DC area. Is it because of all the high tech innovation in that region? Is it because DC is the biggest city in the US? Or is it because, as so many others on this board have said, they like to be within commuting distance of the examiner?
Also, since when am I an inner-belt practitioner? I thought I was an examiner. Or an academic. Oh well, at least I’m not some foreigner. At least, not until I come up with a new fallacy.
“…at least, it shouldn’t be.
Applicants (or more properly, their agents) will naturally gravitate to the nearest PTO office”
The fallacy of an inner-belt practicioner.
will they be paid Detroit or DC/VA wages?
All other things being equal, there are advantages to picking a location with a lot of patent attorneys and agents.
Sure, but all other things are not equal. Remote locations in Alaska and Montana would be poor choices for many reasons, most of which relate to their remoteness from anything you might want to have nearby.
What the PTO needs nearby is examiners. It doesn’t really matter where the agents are. Sure, it’s nice to know that you could pop over to the examiner’s office any day you want, but it’s far from essential. Phoning the examiner can be effective in many cases that require interviews. What’s more, a phone interview can often be done during the very same call rather than scheduling an in-person interview at a future date, which saves both you and the examiner a whole afternoon at the PTO.
Besides, there are agents in Denver and Chicago already, right? And probably in Boston, New York, San Francisco, and other large cities. Would anyone suggest that those agents are less competent to represent an applicant for the sole reason that they don’t have an office within spitting distance of the PTO?
Anyway, if you locate the PTO near a bunch of erstwhile-employed technically skilled people, you’ll invariably wind up close to some of the patent agents who are close to them. Just not too close, because we tend to rent offices in expensive locations.
But the most important thing we’re probably overlooking is that the PTO doesn’t have to choose the single best city in the country. It can choose more than one. It can choose the second or third best city, or any good enough city, and still do fine. It’s not like DC would have been an objectively spectacular choice, if the PTO were moving out of, say, Detroit.
And there was me, thinking that the most efficient way for a patent law firm to blow all its money is to open branch offices, here, there and everywhere.
And here is me, thinking that much of the efficiency displayed by the EPO would leach away, if it were to come to the idea of actually encouraging oral interviews. Only by tightly limiting their availability can the EPO manage its workload, and lay down a file wrapper that delivers for interested third parties a modicum of legal certainty.
Nevertheless, half of Europe’s patent attorneys practise in the Munich area. That has been the case only since the EPO set up in business next to the German Patent Office.
It isn’t. Or at least, it shouldn’t be…Applicants (or more properly, their agents) will naturally gravitate to the nearest PTO office.
I think it should of at least some concern. If the PTO moved to the middle of nowhere in Alaska or Montana, I don’t think a lot of attorneys would move there or fly out routinely. And for less absurd cases (like Detroit), there’s still the cost of moving, which will be reflected in higher costs for clients. All other things being equal, there are advantages to picking a location with a lot of patent attorneys and agents.
It is entirely possible to pick a place that is an attractive location with a large number of potential examiners and a large number of attorneys and agents. Chicago and major cities on the west coast would make sense.
To figure out where to locate a regional office, take the attorney/agent address of each patent for the past ten years and located the centroid (?) of all those addresses relative to the USPTO office in D.c.
That method could easily give you some place in the middle of nowhere. Much more sensible would be to rank the most common cities, eliminate those within a certain distance of DC (New York, probably), and pick from the remainder. My guess is Detroit would not be high on the list.
INANE _ I think you are right about the retention idea. Kids and ownership of a home are what keep people in one location and the USPTO should factor in where would be a good place for examiners to raise a family (e.g. good schools) and where would be a good place to buy affordable homes that are in a safe location. Detroid doesn’t seem to meet either criteria and doesn’t seem to meet the practitioner proximity criteria. Here’s some info I found:
“Denver pops up on radar for regional patent office” articles from August 22, 2006
link to highbeam.com
link to impactlab.net
if the concern is proximity of examiners to applicants.
It isn’t. Or at least, it shouldn’t be.
Applicants (or more properly, their agents) will naturally gravitate to the nearest PTO office. The most important thing for the PTO, in my view, is to give the examining corps more options about where to live, so they’re not restricted to hiring examiners who are willing and able to relocate to DC. Right now, they’re missing out on competent, unemployed potential examiners all over the country.
“Our goal is to get that down to one year. But a key of that is allowing the patent examiners to talk with the innovators and inventors instead of just trading letters and correspondence or e-mails,” Locke said.
If that is the goal, why Detroit? That is much closer to D.C. than, say, just about the rest of the country.
To figure out where to locate a regional office, take the attorney/agent address of each patent for the past ten years and located the centroid (?) of all those addresses relative to the USPTO office in D.c. (Dennis, do you think your or your staff can do that?).
Personally, I think the west coast is a logical location as it then would put everyone in the US within 1 1/2 hours or so by flight away from a USPTO office and would have the most impace on all practitioners.
Hawaii (the president’s first US residence after his birth in xxxxxxxx) or Las Vegas (plenty of cheap rooms and lots of land) would be good choices as there would be a lot of motivation for practitioners to travel to these two location (similar to traveling to Detroid? uh, no).
Here is an idea – almost every federal agency has regional offices. Surely, some of those have some office space available or the federal office space could be rearranged within a given area to accomodiate the needs of each agency. I’m sure there still are a few military bases that could be closed or removed from the military budged and handed over to the Commerce Department for USPTO purposes.
Chicago, LA, Houston, Dallas, SF, Seattle, Minneapolis, Boston, and NYC would all make more sense as a second site of the PTO if the concern is proximity of examiners to applicants.
But if we simply wanted to provide examiners with a lower COL, Detroit isn’t really a bad choice. Just put the office where it’s accessible from safe suburbs.
Mr. Kappos – green field, not brown field.
Detroit? LOL.
Well, at least cost of living is cheap there..
Like anything else. Some will want to make the USPTO a Career. Those will be the keepers. The others already have a plan. I think that is where the USPTO can save, save , save. If you go in there as a stepping stone, then the USPTO has already provided that step. Can anyone go to a 2 year training class without paying something?
Currently, many newly-minted examiners are being sent to work at home right after they finish their training, because the present USPTO office doesn’t have enough space for all of them. That’s a lousy way to ensure that those examiners know what they’re doing. (To compare, you could have graduated at the top of your class from a top law school, but no reputable firm is going to let you sign a paper for at least two years.) It wouldn’t be a bad idea to open another office in another area of the country where rent is cheap and where another large group of examiners could be concentrated.
About 30 years ago, the UK Patent Office moved out of London, lock, stock and barrel, to brand new premises in a rustbelt location in South Wales. From that point, customer service standards at the UK Patent Office jumped impressively upwards.
UK Patent Office customer service has remained tip-top, to this day.
And then there’s Germany. After the war, the PTO forsook Berlin for brand new premises in Munich.
And then there’s the EPO. Brand new premises in 1978. Despite what some grumblers assert, customer service standards at the EPO are excellent.
No doubt readers can cite other such moves, and tell us how important a role morale and esprit de corps plays in delivering high customer service standards.
No chance of the USPTO top floor moving to Detroit though, is there?
Read section b) folks:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/35/usc_sec_35_00000001—-000-.html
AJE,
Who was the commish at the time?
They should open a satellite office in Reno, NV.
1. It’s easily accessible from San Francisco/San Jose/Northern California by driving or by Reno Tahoe International Airport.
2. The Reno area is a great place to live. They won’t have any problem attracting qualified Examiners.
3. The Reno area is a great place to visit. It will give Patent Practitioners a good excuse to get out of the office once in a while.
4. We have high-speed Internet here, too.
30 years ago the US PTO was dangling this carrot out in front of interviewees. we all ended up in dingy apartments in the dc area. it toughened you up for the interactions with the patent attorneys.
I propose Las Vegas for a satellite office. Close to California with all their tech firms and with the real estate bust there, housing has gotten cheap.
Detroit? Get real. Remember that examiners are trained in Alexandria in larger groups (“classes”) for efficient reasons, so training at the regional offices isn’t likely because of economies of scale. So the only ones that would be at the satellite offices would likely be those eligible for the hoteling program. Good luck getting many examiners to move to Detroit (cold, high crime, and nothing to do).
@Willton – how cheap the rent is seems to take a back seat to how shiny the building is. Consider the new patent office. The crystal city PTO has MORE offices for examiners, but they moved to the current group of buildings for a higher cost and less offices. They did it because Madison has an impressive atrium and is prettier (cynical but true).
And honestly, what art unit do you think they’ll be staffing with the good people of Alabama?
Those in TC’s 1700, 3600 and 3700. You may not know this, but Huntsville AL is a NASA hub, and a number of companies that do aeronautical engineering house their engineering facilities in Huntsville (e.g. Boeing) or in neighboring states (e.g., Lockheed Martin). Further, Big Oil files for patents too, and Big Oil is all over the southeast.
The problem the the PTO has is hiring good people to be examiners at the crappy G13 pay rate and expecting them to live in expensive Alexandria.
The livin is cheap in Mo-Town. Way cheaper that it would be in the alleged software/ biotech /hardware hotspot there might be on the west coast.
And, by the way, the mid west has internet capabilities and we know how to write software, we have biotech firms and associated universities and you can even find a chip fab sprinkled here and there.
They need the Employment good choice.
There’s a long history of partnership between Detroit and the USPTO. For example, the Detroit Public Library and the USPTO partnered in 1995 to establish the Great Lakes Patent and Trademark Center fee based search facility in Detroit. That library has also been a Patent and Trademark depository since 1871. Perhaps this history of partnership gives Detroit a leg up in the running to become the first satellite office for USPTO Examiners.
The link goes to the 271 Patent Blog, but they got it from here:
link to crainsdetroit.com
If the PTO opened a satellite office in Alaska,
… all the examiners there could quit two years later, proudly announcing that they’ve already accomplished all their objectives, and they want to avoid the typical unproductive “examination-as-usual” that normally goes on during an examiner’s third year of employment. Besides, the best way for them to get patents examined properly is to quit the examination business, sod off and do something completely different.
Wait, examiners already quit after two years, don’t they?
If the PTO opened a satellite office in Alaska, they could use it the same way as Siberia in the old Soviet Union, and send any examiners there who were persona non grata, LOL!
Right now I can do a personal interview with any examiner on any day. Not so easy if some of them are in Detroit, and perhaps some in, say, Seattle or on a green field site in, say, Alabama.
Fair enough, but on how many days do you actually conduct a personal interview with an examiner? And what of all the patent agents elsewhere in the country who can’t conduct a personal interview without losing a day to travel? They manage, somehow.
And honestly, what art unit do you think they’ll be staffing with the good people of Alabama?
I’m just surprised that this idea has finally been picked up, after people have been arguing for it for years. I think it’s a good idea in principle, although from where I sit in Washington DC I don’t think it will do me much good personally. Right now all the examiners are only a few miles away, and that’s ultimately why we’re here.
Will they relocate, say, automotive and other mechanical art units to Detroit, or, as I suspect is more likely, randomly distribute examiners between locations irrespective of art unit?
Right now I can do a personal interview with any examiner on any day. Not so easy if some of them are in Detroit, and perhaps some in, say, Seattle or on a green field site in, say, Alabama.
I look forward to Oblon opening a Detroit office, since they seem to need to be as close to every USPTO building as possible.
In addition, keep in mind that with the hiring surge of the PTO in the last 5 or so years, many of the Examiners are young and still renting. With the cost of living in the DC area and the potential to just hotel from somewhere else in the country, I know many an Examiner who have simply held off on buying a home knowing that they’ll get more value for their dollar somewhere else.
sarah for Congress!
Not all people that are qualified own a home. But most need Jobs. And how else do we move the economy. Wow new apartment bldgs. eateries, gas stations,Homes. Sounds like Walmart already.
Was going to say exactly what Wilton said. The cost of opening a satellite office in Detroit (or some suburb thereof) surely would be cheaper than Chicago, right?
Also, I don’t think there would be a huge problem filling space with Examiners in that office. It’s still an advantage for Examiners who are from or have ties to anywhere in the Midwest instead of living on the right coast. Half of my particular AU is from one of WI/MI/IL/IN.
Fair enough, though I think few Republicans feel sorry for Detroit, and even fewer support government action to assist it. “85% of Republicans oppose the GM bailout.”
link to stewartandpartners.com
Given the likely results of the election, I’m not sure talking about helping Detroit by expanding a government program is going to make for good talking points.
Regarding office space prices: the Cushman & Wakefield 2010 survey doesn’t have data for Detroit, but it does for several other US cities. Chicago ($38/sqft) was lower than Boston, Houston, LA West, Miami, NY midtown, NY downtown, San Francisco, San Jose / Silicon Valley, and Washington. Not too bad.
That said, a cursory survey suggests Detroit office space would be about 2/3rds the price of Chicago. Of course, they could do even better in St. Louis.
Build it and They will move.
They’ll need somewhere to live if they move. Only, they can’t sell their current house because they owe the bank more than it’s worth, and what bank would lend them money for a mortgage on a second house?
You really do have to put the jobs where the people you want already are.
Build it and They will move. You could build it in a Corn Field. It’s a Job. People need Jobs. Walmart does it all the time.
One should also take into account that in order for the USPTO to set up a satellite office, it needs office space in which to place said office. I imagine real estate prices are considerably lower in and around Detroit than they are in and around Chicago.
I don’t think it can just be pure politics, though, since surely Chicago would win that fight.
Yes, but they need Congressmen from all over the country to vote for it, and it’s easier for voters across the country to feel sorry for Detroit.
I don’t think it can just be pure politics, though, since surely Chicago would win that fight. You can’t get much more solidly blue than Chicago, and it’s hardly a stranger to pork barrel politics. The administration also has much closer ties to Chicago & Illinois than Detroit & Michigan.
I figure either Detroit has been lobbying while other cities have been asleep at the switch, or someone with seriously misplaced priorities is treating this as a generic jobs program without any regard for the need for technically trained employees and (to a lesser extent) patent attorneys and agents. I don’t think Detroit has a lot of either compared to many other large cities, though I’d be happy to be proven wrong.
Detroit? What an odd choice,
It’s undoubtedly a political choice. The PTO still needs Congress to let them open regional offices, so the proposal needs to pander a bit. I’m sure any Congressional authority would be suitably general to allow the PTO to open offices in multiple locations. I couldn’t imagine them legislating “DC and Detroit only”.
James Daily, agreed. Detroit makes no sense whatsoever from the viewpoint of the public convenience. However, it makes a lot of sense from the viewpoint of Detroit and the political party that controls both Detroit and the PTO.
Detroit? What an odd choice, unless the idea is to try to bolster a failing economy with a government employer. That’s unlikely to do much good in this case anyway, since the PTO satellite office would surely be significantly smaller than the Alexandria office, and it only employs ~9700 people.
By contrast, there are 4.4 million people in the Detroit metro area, and the metro unemployment rate is 15.3%. Every little bit helps, I guess, but I think it would make vastly more sense to open a satellite office on the west coast, since that’s where a lot of the software, hardware, and biotech development is anyway.
Further, how many unemployed people with in-demand technical backgrounds live in Detroit? I don’t think Detroit is home to legions of people with computer science and biology degrees just waiting to work for the patent office. And if you think convincing people to relocate to Alexandria is hard…
A midwest office is a good idea, but surely Chicago would be a far better choice than Detroit.
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