Harrity Thought-Leaders Provide Comments on USPTO’s National Strategy for Expanding American Innovation

Harrity diversity thought-leaders Elaine Spector, Edward Kim, and Ayana Marshall provided comments in response to USPTO‘s National Strategy for Expanding American Innovation alongside other members of the Intellectual Property Owners Association (IPO)‘s Women in IP and Diversity & Inclusion committees.

“An important aspect for moving innovation with respect to under-represented groups is to understand the extent of the issue, and then track improvements with regard to innovation and commercialization.”
Read the full response below:

For more information regarding our diversity initiatives, visit harrityllp.com/diversity.  To see more diversity and inclusion resources, visit The Diversity Channel.

 

Harrity Welcomes Ten Superstar Attorneys in 2020

2020 was a difficult year for all – with plenty of pitfalls, including quarantining, social distancing, and economic concern brought on by the ongoing global pandemic. At Harrity, we were fortunate enough to be able to continue to provide outstanding service to our clients and build upon the productivity and success of our remote workforce. We are pleased to announce that our firm also welcomed ten superstar patent attorneys to our team in 2020, making it one of our biggest years of growth to date.

Check out the newest members of Team Harrity below!

Robert ‘Bob’ O’Loughlin | Lakewood, CO (Joined 1/6/2020)

Bob has over 12 years of experience in patent preparation and prosecution for electrical and mechanical applications, with specific expertise in software patentability in light of Alice. Prior to joining Harrity & Harrity, Bob worked for over a decade in private practice representing clients with a focus on collaborating to navigate intellectual property opportunities and risks in light of his clients’ objectives regarding innovation, commercialization and competition. Click here to learn more about Bob.

James Bennin | Winter Garden, FL  (Joined 2/3/2020)

James is the first recipient of Harrity’s Minority Firm Incubator, a four-year program designed to train, develop, and launch minority-owned patent law firms. James has 15 years of experience in the intellectual property field, with extensive experience counseling clients on various IP matters in the United States and in various other jurisdictions. Prior to joining Harrity in the MFI program, James was previously an associate general counsel at one of the largest universities in the US, and IP counsel at a large multinational company where he counseled multiple business units on matters related to IP. Click here to learn more about James.

Michael Woodward | Albany, NY (Joined 2/3/2020)

Michael has experience in conducting all phases of prosecution for U.S. and foreign patent applications related to computer software, telecommunications, networking devices, and mechanical devices. Prior to joining Harrity, Michael worked at a boutique intellectual property law firm where his practice focused on patent preparation, prosecution, litigation, and patent portfolio management. He also served as Executive Managing Editor of the Albany Law Review, President of the Intellectual Property Law Society, and was a Sponsler Honors Teaching Fellow while attending Albany Law School. Click here to learn more about Michael.

Alexander Zajac | Greenbelt, MD (Joined 4/6/2020)

Alex is a patent attorney specializing in the preparation and prosecution of applications in electrical and computer technologies. Prior to Harrity, Alex worked with an intellectual property law firm in Washington, DC, where he drafted and prosecuted patent applications as well as assisted with opinions and litigations. He also previously worked at the United States District Court for the District of Columbia with Magistrate Judge Alan Kay. Click here to learn more about Alex.

Steven DiPasquo | Basking Ridge, NJ (Joined 6/1/2020)

Steven has prepared and prosecuted hundreds of patent applications in a wide range of technical fields, including artificial intelligence and machine learning, computer hardware and software systems, and telecommunications. Prior to joining Harrity & Harrity, Steven worked for over 15 years in private practice and has extensive experience counseling clients and preparing opinions regarding patentability, infringement, validity, and freedom to operate. Click here to learn more about Steven.

Nelson Nolte | Manchester, MO (Joined 6/16/2020)

Nelson has more than twenty years of experience as a patent attorney, including patent preparation, prosecution, opinion matters, trademark preparation and prosecution, and copyright protection. During this time, Nelson has drafted and prosecuted hundreds of patent applications in the electrical, software and mechanical arts. Click here to learn more about Nelson.

Madhu Ramanujam | Portland, OR (Joined 7/13/2020)

Madhu’s experience as a patent attorney includes diverse areas of technology, particularly in the electrical and software arts. He has extensive experience in developing patent licensing strategies and creating claim charts to maximize a patent’s monetary value. As an inventor himself, Madhu’s knowledge in patent licensing and his passion for inventing has led to him successfully licensing his own patents to several large multinational corporations. Click here to learn more about Madhu.

Edward Kim | New York, NY (Joined 8/3/2020)

Edward’s practice focuses on helping companies build high-quality patent portfolios in an efficient manner, with specific experience prosecuting patent applications related to up-and-coming technologies. Prior to joining Harrity, Edward worked in patent litigation and spent over a decade as a Primary Patent Examiner at the USPTO. During this time, Edward served the Office of International Patent Cooperation on global IP initiatives. He previously has experience working with engineers overseas as an intern engineer and is both fluent in Korean and proficient in Japanese. Click here to learn more about Edward.

George Howarah | Reston, VA  (Joined 11/2/2020)

George is a patent attorney with nearly a decade of experience in all facets of patent procurement and enforcement. Prior to joining Harrity, George worked as a Patent Examiner at the United States Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO) and as an associate at Venable LLP and Sterne, Kessler, Goldstein & Fox PLLC, where he prepared, prosecuted, and enforced patents for Fortune 500, midsize, and startup companies. Click here to learn more about George.

Jim Weixel | Sandwich, MA (Joined 12/14/2020)

Jim is a patent attorney with over 20 years of in-house and law firm experience in patent procurement enforcement and in IP operations, including time at Verizon, Bowditch & Dewey, LLP, and The MathWorks Inc. Most recently, Jim served as the IP lead at Accenture for several business units, with a combined annual revenue exceeding $20B. Jim has been involved with protecting innovations in a variety of technologies, such as healthcare, financial services, machine learning, process automation, artificial intelligence, biometric identification, and pharmacovigilance. Click here to learn more about Jim.

 

Patents for Humanity

By Edward Kim, Harrity Associate

Some time ago, in discussing humanitarian efforts and engineering, a friend of mine told me about a concept project he worked on to create a new iteration of the Leveraged Freedom Chair (LFC), an all-terrain wheelchair manufactured by Global Research Innovation and Technology (GRIT).  The original LFC was created by engineering graduates of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to allow people with disabilities in developing countries to gain mobility and independence.  Conventional wheelchairs didn’t function well on the rugged terrain and rough local roads, and most were difficult and expensive to maintain.  The three-wheeled LFC uses a push-lever drivetrain to help people navigate over rugged terrain with ease and is built from commonly found bicycle parts to allow easy maintenance and repair.  Naturally, being an intellectual property professional, I started looking into patents related to the LFC.

That’s when I first discovered Patents for Humanity, an awards competition hosted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).  The creators of the LFC secured US Patent No. 8,844,959 in 2014 and was awarded a Patents for Humanity award in the subsequent year.  Nearly a decade has passed since the program itself started, but little is known about it.  Given the current situation with the global pandemic, and the season of giving around us, I thought it might be timely to share some information about the awards competition with our network of IP professionals.

Patents for Humanity was launched in February 2012 as part of an initiative to promote “game-changing innovations to address long-standing development challenges” and showcase how patent holders are pioneering innovative ways to provide affordable, scalable, and sustainable solutions for the less fortunate.  Awards have been given for innovations that range from Golden Rice that’s genetically enhanced to provide a source of vitamin A for people relying mainly on rice to the LFC to compact human wastewater converters called NEWgenerator.

Two types of awards are given – Patents for Humanity awards and Honorable Mentions awards.  Patents for Humanity award recipients are given an acceleration certificate, and of course, public recognition of their work at an awards ceremony sponsored by the USPTO.  The certificate can be used to accelerate a patent application examination, ex parte reexamination, and ex parte appeal to the Patent Trial and Appeal Board.*  Honorable Mentions award recipients receive accelerated examination of one patent application but not other types of matters.

The program is open to patent owners, applicants, licensees (including inventors who haven’t assigned their ownership rights to others), assignees, and exclusive and non-exclusive licensees.  Applicants must describe how they’ve used their patented technology or products to address a humanitarian issue, which, for the competition purposes, is defined as “one significantly affecting the public health or quality of life of an impoverished population.”

Applicants using a patent application as a basis for entry to the competition must show that a Notice of Allowance for one or more claims from that patent application has been issued before any certificate is awarded.  Applicants mainly compete in the following five categories:

  • Medicine: any medical-related technology such as medicines, vaccines, diagnostics, or medical devices.
  • Nutrition: technologies which improve nutrition such as higher yield crops, more nutritious food sources, food preservation, storage, or preparation.
  • Sanitation: improving lives by addressing environmental factors such as clean water, waste treatment, air pollution, and toxic substances.
  • Household energy: technologies providing power to energy-poor homes and communities for household needs like lighting, cooking, and heating.
  • Living standards: technologies that raise living standards to empower people to escape poverty, such as literacy, education, communications, information delivery, access to markets, and microfinance.

Applicants may also team together to submit joint applications explaining actions taken by multiple parties.  However, only one certificate will be issued to the joint applicants, and the certificate can be redeemed for only one matter.

The applications are then judged under one of two criteria: (1) Humanitarian Use (applying eligible technologies to positively impact a humanitarian issue, focusing on demonstrable real-world improvements) and (2) Humanitarian Research (making available patented technologies to other researchers for conducting research with a humanitarian purpose, particularly areas lacking commercial application).

The applications are reviewed and scored by qualified judges outside of the USPTO, and the USPTO forwards the top-scoring applications to participating federal agencies for award recipient recommendations.

As we prepare to bid farewell to a year that will live in infamy, I think it’s fitting to recognize this year’s award recipients: Global Vision 2020; Sisu Global; Sanaria Inc; Flexcrevator; NEWgenerator; Nonspec; Rubitection; and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.  Congratulations!  Perhaps, now more than ever, we need and should honor more innovation that makes progress in human lives.  Keep an eye out for the next awards competition application period.

More information about the Patents for Humanity awards competition can be found at:

https://www.uspto.gov/ip-policy/patent-policy/patents-humanity

For those interested in the details of the Terms and Conditions:

https://www.uspto.gov/sites/default/files/documents/USPTO-P4H-2020Terms.pdf

 

*Inter partes matters and other post-grant proceedings may not be accelerated with the certificate at this time.