119 – Vikrum Aiyer of the USPTO – Hallway of Ideas

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Patent and trademark law with Vikrum Aiyer …

Vikrum D. Aiyer (bio), Chief of Staff for the US Patent and Trademark Office in the US Department of Commerce, and former Senior Advisor in the White House National Economic Council, joins joins Pavan Bahl, Rob Sanchez and Marc Raco (in his first-ever podcast appearance) in Washington, DC at the Fashion + Tech Showcase presented by the Fashion Innovation Alliance.

Support, lowering barriers, and youth in DC

Aiyer delves into how anyone who has idea they want to scale into an opportunity for others can access the right tools to navigate the intellectual property (IP) system. USPTO offers the right tools to support pursuing funding and to scale prototypes, including when an international company. Aiyer discusses the support available for the entire commercialization lifecycle, and how USPTO is lowering barriers. How age is professionally perceived in DC, wunderkinds and shaggy beards.

Innovation, patent trolls, and transparency

New, complex conflicts in IP, patents at same breath as lawsuits, the USPTO’s 225 year history, doubts of whether IP advances innovation and invention, and cultural skepticism in the sharpest people. What the USPTO is doing to help people fight “patent trolls”, and the complexity of emerging fields based on the combinations of existing things. Aiyer touches on the 2011 American Invents Act and suite of collaborative executive, the creation of programs to help inventors include responses to demand letters, an online litigation tool kit, and connections to legal databases. How the USPTO has tried to invest in transparency of who IP ownership, clarification of the quality of what is claimed in a patent right, where one patent starts and another one ends, advanced manufacturing partnership, regional offices to leverage discussion with industries to make us of feedback loops, and more.

Defending design, a social contract, and optimism

A conversation on the difficulty defending design, ambitious innovators, the basic social contract of intellectual property and sharing knowledge with public’s ability to benefit, the multi-lateral body focused on design issues around the world, and trying to keep up with changes. The cost efficiency of provisional patents, the importance of filing quickly, how the USPTO wants to provide more tools and make process more accessible, and why Americans can and should be optimistic about how recurring sense of invention will tackle challenges of new century.