Senate to take up patent reform legislation.(INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY)

The Senate Committee on the Judiciary has passed patent reform legislation and the full Senate may take up the bill as early as next month, sources say. The Senate's bill is similar to legislation passed by the House last September (CW Sept. 19, 2007, p. 49). Both bills would eliminate the first-to-invent protections currently offered by the U.S. to those who are first to develop a new technology, and grant those protections instead to those who are the first to submit their paperwork to the U.S. patent office. The patent reform bills also intends to limit infringement claims.

The U.S. is the only country with the first-to-invent clause, and the proposed reforms would …