By
Kevin E. Noonan —

Rep.
Lamar Smith's H.R. 6621 came up for a vote today on the House
floor under a suspension of the rules permitting the House to consider and vote
upon the measure without debate.  In
contrast with Rep. Smith's (at right) earlier version of the bill (see "Pre-GATT Patent Applications Threatened by Lamar Smith's H.R. 6621"), this version
substituted the requirement for a "report" to Congress on the status
of so-called "pre-GATT" applications rather than inserting into a law
a provision that would effectively eliminate patent rights.

The
new provision, Section 1(m), reads as follows:

(m)
REPORT ON PRE-GATT APPLICATIONS.– Using existing resources, not later than four
months after the date of the enactment of this Act, the Director of the United
States Patent and Trademark Office shall submit a report to the Committees on
the Judiciary of the United States House of Representatives and the Senate that
describes–
    (1) the total number of pending United States
applications for patent that–
        (A)
are not subject to an order under section 181 of title 35, United States Code;
and
        (B)
were filed before the effective date of the amendments made by section 532 of
the Uruguay Round Agreements Act (Public Law 103–465; 108 Stat. 4983);

    (2)
the filing date of each such application;

    (3)
the filing date of the earliest application for which each such application
claims the benefit of or a right of priority to its filing date;
    (4)
the inventor and assignee named on each such application;
    (5)
the amount of time that examination of each such application has been delayed
because of a proceeding under section 135(a) of title 35, United States Code,
an appeal to the Patent Trial and Appeal Board under section 134(a) of such
title, a civil action in a United States District Court under section 145 or
146 of such title, or an appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the
Federal Circuit under section 141 of such title; and
    (6)
other information about such applications that the Director believes is
relevant to their pendency.

This
is a vast improvement over the earlier provision:

(m) Effective Date of Uruguay Round Agreements Act–
    (1) CERTAIN PATENT APPLICATIONS—
Notwithstanding section 534(b)(1) of the Uruguay Round Agreements Act (35
U.S.C. 154 note), section 154(a) of title 35, United States Code, as amended by
section 532 of the Uruguay Round Agreements Act (Public Law 103-465; 108 Stat.
4809), shall apply, and section 154(c)(1) of title 35, United States Code,
shall not apply, to any application that is –
        (A) filed before the date that is 6 months after the date of
the enactment of the Uruguay Round Agreements Act; and
        (B) pending on a date that is 1 year or more after the date of
the enactment of this Act.
    (2)
EFFECTIVE DATE– This subsection shall take effect on the
date that is 1 year after the date of the enactment of this Act and shall apply
to any original plant or utility patent application that is pending on or after
that effective date.

The
revised bill also removes a provision that would have repealed 35 U.S.C. § 325(f)
and thus subjected reissue patents to post-grant review.

The
bill did not pass today, due in large measure to the objections of Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) (at left).  Rep. Rohrabacher's objections were reportedly based on section 1(m)(4)
of the bill, which would require the report to identify "the inventor and assignee
named on each such application."  Although
this information is routinely set forth in the PTO's PAIR database for
applications filed after November 29, 2000 that are published (i.e., not subject to the non-publication
provisions of the American Inventors Protection Act of 1999), Rep. Rohrabacher correctly notes that pre-GATT applications are
entitled to non-disclosure of any part of their prosecution history until
grant, being considered completely ex
parte by the PTO.  It is unclear why
Rep. Smith included this provision in the bill, unless he was persuaded that
applicant delay (and thus culpability) was the source of the delay that has
kept these applications pending and thus that there was a public interest
justification in notifying competitors that such pre-GATT patents were
pending.

This would not be surprising
but it is wrong (and not the first time a misapprehension of the facts has
motivated introduction of a provision in a patent reform bill; see "The (Un)Intended Consequences of the Law").  While these cases are
somewhat of an embarrassment to the Office (insofar as their existence can be
used to insinuate that the Office has been tardy in examining them), there is
little evidence that applicants have "gamed" the system to delay
grant.  The majority of these
applications have been involved in protracted interferences, appeals, or had
examination suspended for Office consideration of third party interferences
that would influence the patentability of pending claims.  That applicants
have not been responsible for the delay in prosecuting these applications is
evidenced by the implementing legislation and PTO rules concerning these
patents, which were drafted to prevent such shenanigans.  For example, "transitional"
procedures adopted by the Office permitted an applicant to petition for withdrawal
of the finality of a rejection but this opportunity could only be used twice;
thereafter, the only recourse for pre-GATT applications was filing an
appeal.  Filing a continuation or Request for Continued Examination in
these applications strips such applications of their pre-GATT status and would
result in the same loss-of-rights that the original version of the bill would
cause.  The Office's carefully crafted rules were designed to minimize
long pendencies for pre-GATT cases, a policy that undoubtedly is responsible
for limiting the number of existing cases to 200.

The
easiest path to passage would be for Rep. Smith to delete this requirement from
the bill.  Whether he does so should shed some light on the motivations behind
these provisions directed towards pre-GATT applications, although if the Office's
performance regarding reports mandated by the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act
are any guide, it may be a while before the Office can issue this latest report
requested to satisfy the specific concerns of a Member of Congress (see "USPTO Report on Genetic Testing Delayed" and "USPTO to Hold Roundtable on Genetic Diagnostic Testing").

Update: Last night, the House passed an amended version of H.R 6621 by a 308-89 vote.  In the bill that was passed, § 1(m) was amended to only require a report on pre-GATT applications.