Government Patent Policy XXXII The Commission has noted the increasing participation of the Federal Government in the financing of research, development, testing and engineering, and the many problems related to the ownership of patents resulting from such work. The Commission decided not to address itself to the question of the distribution of rights in inventions resulting from research and development work financed wholly or in part by the Government. This question is being considered actively elsewhere in the Executive Branch and by Committees of the Congress. Nevertheless, it is the Commission's hope that any action Congress may take in this regard will promote the purposes of the patent system to encourage invention and innovation and the resulting economic development and benefits. International Action XXXIII To promote more harmonious international relations, particularly with regard to the protection of industrial property: The United States should take a position in Some member countries of the Paris Convention, in particular the U.S.S.R. and some Eastern European countries, issue inventor's certificates as well as patents. While some Convention countries voluntarily recognize inventor's certificates for priority purposes, there is no obligation under the Convention to do so. At present, the U.S. patent statute prevents the recognition for priority purposes of anything but an application for patent in another Convention country. The proposal for revision is on the agenda of the Stockholm Conference, which is to be held in 1967. According to the proposal, the date of an application for an inventor's certificate in one Convention country would be recognized for priority purposes in all Convention countries. It is noted that the proposed revision is limited to inventor's certificates from countries in which inventors have the right to apply for either a patent or an inventor's certificate. XXXIV Efforts should be made to have the Paris Con- The present text of the Paris Convention requires that "Patents obtained with the benefit of priority shall have in the various countries of the Union a duration equal to that which they would have had if they had been applied for or granted without the benefit of priority." Since the Convention forbids calculation of the term of a patent from the foreign filing date, it prevents measurement of the term from the effective filing date when foreign priority is claimed. Thus a foreign applicant who can claim a foreign priority date would receive a longer period of protection than an applicant who filed a domestic application on such date. Of course, a corresponding advantage is accorded U.S. inventors filing abroad. Movement toward a universal patent system (Recommendation No. XXXV) would be promoted if an entire international family of related patents expired at the same time. This requires a common measuring point for the patent term. The effective (foreign or domestic) filing date, unlike the earliest domestic filing date, would constitute such a common measuring point. XXXV The Commission believes that the ultimate To this end the Commission specifically recom- There are great differences today among the patent systems of the various countries. The inventor who desires worldwide or even multi-national patent protection for his discovery must file a multitude of applications, each governed by a separate and distinct system of laws, rules, regulations and procedures. Even after the patent has been obtained, the inventor is confronted with diverse systems of maintaining patent protection. These factors increase the cost of securing multi-national patent protection and often cloud the status of an invention in a particular country, thus discouraging foreign investment and marketing. If change is to be achieved, nations must adopt a single set of long-range goals to guide their intermediate and shortrange movements. Any attempt by revolutionary change, to scrap present systems in favor of new ones, in the United States or abroad, is neither feasible nor desirable. It is, however, both possible and advantageous to promote and direct interim steps toward the ultimate goal-a universal patent. To the extent that harmonization of U.S. practice with prevailing foreign practice can be attained without injury to the quality of the U.S. patent system, such harmonization should be introduced as a first step toward the desired goal. This consideration applies both to the substantive law and to the forms and procedures for implementing it. Other recommendations in this report are responsive to this general objective. Where, however, U.S. practice appears to be the superior one, it is recommended that appropriate Federal agencies make efforts to secure harmonization compatible with U.S. practice. As an intermediate step toward attainment of a universal patent, the formation of regional patent system groupings should be encouraged. Within such groupings there will inevitably develop a mutual respect for the search and judgment capabilities of the members. This should lead to cooperative searching and, beyond that, to mutually recognized patents among the members of the group. The avoidance of the duplication of effort, expense and delay is a clearly attainable benefit from such a development. |