Senate Intellectual Property Subcommittee ranking member Thom Tillis, R-N.C., introduced legislation Wednesday he said will “restore patent eligibility” for innovative inventions across various fields. The Patent Eligibility Restoration Act is aimed at addressing patent eligibility confusion, and Tillis’ office said the bill would help strengthen U.S. positions in 5G, blockchain, artificial intelligence and biotechnology. The bill resolves concerns about the patenting of “mere ideas,” the “mere discovery of what already exists in nature, and social and cultural content that everyone agrees is beyond the scope of the patent system.” Computer & Communications Industry Association Patent Counsel Josh Landau said CCIA appreciates Tillis’ understanding “that this is a complex area of patent law and that it will take time to get it right. We have concerns about the expansion of eligibility the bill contains, and look forward to working with Senator Tillis to improve the bill."

Senate Intellectual Property Subcommittee leadership introduced bipartisan legislation Tuesday that would direct a federal study on improving the “patent examination process and the overall quality of patents” issued by the Patent and Trademark Office. Introduced by Chair Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., and ranking member Thom Tillis, R-N.C., the Patent Examination and Quality Improvement Act directs the comptroller general of the U.S. to deliver a report to the Senate and House Judiciary Committees one year after enactment with an evaluation on improving patent examination. The PTO would deliver another report a year after that. The PTO report would examine how to improve “technical training of patent examiners with respect to emerging areas of technology, the status of office IT systems, a 5-year IT modernization plan, an accounting of the use by the office of advanced data science analytics and a 5-year modernization plan regarding advanced data science analytics, and finally how the result of the application of advanced data science analytics can be regularly shared with the public.”

The Copyright Office’s electronic copyright system is mostly back online after a scheduled Aug. 12 “technical upgrade” rendered it unavailable to the public, the CO emailed Friday. “We are experiencing a few technical issues that we are working diligently to resolve.” System users who haven’t logged in during the past 90 days may “experience account reactivation issues,” the CO said.

A team of six LG Display engineers invented a newly structured OLED display device designed to overcome the color reproduction and efficiency limitations of conventional white OLED technology, said a U.S. patent application (20200411787) filed Sept. 9 and published Thursday at the Patent and Trademark Office. The newly invented OLED display device “comprises two emission portions between first and second electrodes,” in which at least one of the emission portions includes two emitting layers, boosting efficiency and the color reproduction ratio, it said. An organic light-emitting diode emitting white light in a conventional OLED display contains a structure of two emitting layers in which “colors are complementary to each other,” said the application. This structure generates a difference between a wavelength area of an electroluminescence peak of each emitting layer and a transmissive area of a color filter when white light passes through, it said. The structure makes it “difficult to obtain a desired color reproduction ratio,” it said. The inventors “have recognized the aforementioned problems” and devised an OLED display device “of a new structure,” it said. The structure’s first emission portion includes a green-emitting layer and a red-emitting layer, while the second emission portion includes a dark blue-emitting layer, it said.

Sonos landed a U.S. patent Tuesday for a tunable “music discovery dial” on a user's “command device” for reducing the stress of finding and playing back streamed digital audio content by emulating the functionality of an old-fashioned radio. Though streaming audio services have made accessing audio content easier “by placing millions of audio tracks a click or tap away, music discovery using such services is harder than ever,” says the patent (10,877,726), based on a May 18 application. “For many users, instant access to millions of songs can feel like an unmanageable degree of choice. If a user knows what song they want to hear, they can play that song in a myriad of ways, such as by searching for that song, by selecting that song from a saved playlist, or by speaking a voice command to play that song.” But for users who might want to “stumble across something that they would not normally listen to,” modern graphical user interfaces or voice commands don’t work well because they may lead users “to listen to the same music over and over,” it says. To ease music discovery, the invented command device may include a dial to facilitate tuning to different streaming audio channels, “similar to how rotating the frequency dial of a radio tunes the radio to different stations,” it says. “In contrast to the millions of songs available from a streaming audio service, the number of streaming audio channels of a dial can be limited to a manageable degree of choice.” Unlike the dial on a traditional radio, the command device can be personalized via a user’s “playback history,” says the patent. “Using such history, streaming audio channels can be configured to include music that is unexpected or new for a particular user, rather than just generally out-of-the-mainstream.” Sonos didn't comment on commercialization plans.

Samsung with subsidiaries was 2019's “most inventive” company, with 9,413 U.S. utility patents granted, reported Sqoop. The document search engine for journalists has compiled patent-search data since 2014. Rounding out the top five in U.S. patents granted: IBM, 9,190 patents; LG, 4,938; Canon, 3,565; and Intel, 3,501.

One U.S. agency is at odds with the FTC having won its case against Qualcomm over the company's alleged mobile chip monopoly. "The district court’s ruling threatens competition, innovation, and national security," said the government's "statement of interest" on the chipmaker's motion for partial stay of injunction pending appeal. "Its liability determination misapplied Supreme Court precedent, and its remedy is unprecedented. Immediate implementation of the remedy could put our nation’s security at risk, potentially undermining U.S. leadership in 5G technology and standard-setting." Qualcomm likely would succeed on the merits of the appeal, said the filing (in Pacer). The case began at the end of the Obama administration over dissent of the then-sole Republican commissioner. U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh in San Jose had issued a permanent injunction over some of the company's IP licensing practices (see 1905220035), which the defendant appealed to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. That's where the government made its new request, and where also this week, stakeholders including Ericsson backed (in Pacer) Qualcomm's partial stay request pending appeal. An FTC spokesperson declined to "comment on DOJ’s views on the Qualcomm case."

Both Comcast and Rovi are claiming partial victory in an International Trade Commission administrative law judge's initial determination Tuesday on patent violation complaints by Rovi against Comcast. ALJ MaryJoan McNamara said of the three patents, Comcast had infringed on one, one was invalid and Comcast hadn't infringed on the third. Rovi parent TiVo said Wednesday the decision followed a 2017 ITC final ruling on Comcast infringing on Rovi patents for remote record functionality, with Comcast subsequently removing the feature from its products. Comcast in a statement said McNamara's initial determination was a win because there was no violation with two of the patents, and five other patents had been previously withdrawn from the case. It said even if ITC full review later this year on the remaining patent goes against it, a minor modification of a search feature screen should fix that without impacting customers or its business. "We will continue to resist Rovi’s efforts to force Comcast and our customers to make unreasonable payments for aging and obsolete patents," it said. TiVo closed down 6.9 percent Wednesday at $6.93.

Comments are due June 6 on a Neodron Tariff Act Section 337 complaint at the International Trade Commission, seeking a ban on imports of touch-controlled smartphones, tablets and computers that allegedly infringe its patents, said Wednesday's Federal Register. The Ireland-based company alleges Amazon, Dell, HP, Lenovo, Microsoft, Motorola and Samsung are importing mobile devices that infringe its patented technologies for capacitive touch sensors. Thursday, those companies didn't comment. Neodron seeks a limited exclusion order and cease and desist orders banning importation and sale of infringing devices.

The International Trade Commission is investigating Rovi allegations of patent infringements involving various Comcast set-top boxes, broadband gateways and related hardware and software including remote controls and interactive program guides, it said Thursday. Comcast didn't comment Friday.