The Senate Judiciary Committee holds a business meeting Thursday on S. 23, the Patent Reform Act.

By chance, we spotted this 1967 coverage of the issue.

The patents committee of the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) has thrown its full support to the broad objectives of the Report of the Presidents Commission on the Patent System. At a meeting in New York City, the committee also indicated that it would welcome an opportunity to assist in the legislative resolution of the issues presented in the report (C& EN, Dec. 12, 1966, page 27).

Under the chairmanship of Frederic O. Hess, president of Selas Corp. Of America, the association’s patents committee applauded the efforts of the President’s commission to propose constructive improvements of the patent system. The recommendations are part of an interrelated and coherent plan to counter the obsolescence of the current patent system, a situation created by industry by the many new products it makes, Mr. Hess said. (continue reading…)

Yesterday, Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Ranking Member Jeff Sessions (R-AL) announced that a new agreement to patent reform legislation had been made.

Sen. Leahy’s Patent Reform Act of 2009, (S. 515) passed through the Judiciary Committee thanks to Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s deft ability to bring parties on both sides of the controversial damages provisions together to agree on compromise language –- language that the NAM was supportive of because it ensured that no one sector would get a bonanza at the expense of another business sector.

Despite that success, S. 515 got hung up on other less high-profile, but just as important issues. After nine months of negotiations, another agreement (that contains the same compromise language on damages) appears to be in the making. While the official amendment-in-the-form-of-a-substitute language has yet to be released, we’re told that there’s been substantial movement on a number of issues.

While litigation reforms are very important, key to all manufacturers’ concerns is how will the US Patent & Trademark Organization fare – will there be an end to the diversion of their fees into the general treasury? Will USTPO Director David Kappos have the ability to make rules and set new fees? What’s being done to improve patent quality and decrease the time it takes to have a patent issued? The National Academy of Sciences issued a report in 2004 highly critical of how resources were being allocated to the USPTO, and offered a number of fixes that would not only strengthen the USPTO, but in the long run, strengthen our nation’s manufacturers’ ability to innovate.

As soon as we know what the new bill language looks like, we’ll make sure that the NAM’s members find out. More news as it comes in over the transom…

(Marc-Anthony Signorino is technology director for the National Association of Manufacturers)