Saturday, February 13, 2016

WSJ - Patent Litigation Up in 2015, Despite Efforts to Rein it In

In the Wall Street Journal article Patent Litigation Up in 2015, Despite Efforts to Rein it In, Ashby Jone's refers to a RPX report as supporting that non-practicing entities (NPEs) lawsuits seeking to monetize patents are flourishing in 2015 despite Congress' patent reform efforts and the Supreme Court decision making it more difficult to get a software patent in Alice.

The article is interesting, but doesn't explain why patent infringement lawsuits filed vary in 2013-2015:

2015: NPEs filed 3,604 lawsuits

2014: NPEs filed 2,891 lawsuits

2013: NPEs filed 3,733 lawsuits

Despite lots of activity, Congress didn't pass any significant patent reform in 2013-2015. Further, although the Supreme Court's heightened standard for software patent eligibility in Alice might explain why less software patent owners would want to file a lawsuit in 2014, it doesn't explain the rise in lawsuits in 2015.

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