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This week, Council for Innovation Promotion Board Co-Chair Andrei Iancu and Executive Director Frank Cullen joined World Intellectual Property Organization Director-General Daren Tang in visiting IP-intensive businesses across the Los Angeles area.  Few places rival the Golden State, and Los Angeles in particular, when considering the extensive benefits of strong intellectual property policies. Indeed, more

Claim: Senator Bernie Sanders (D-VT), Chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, & Pensions (HELP) Committee, hosted a hearing entitled “Taxpayers Paid Billions For It: So Why Would Moderna Consider Quadrupling the Price of the COVID Vaccine?” The hearing was predicated on Sen. Sanders’ belief that the government shouldered the burden of researching and developing

This week, Council for Innovation Promotion (C4IP) Founders and Co-Chairs David Kappos and Andrei Iancu participated in the 2023 Annual International Trademark Association Meeting in Singapore. As former directors of the United States Patent and Trademark Office during the Obama and Trump administrations, respectively, Dave and Andrei spoke about how intellectual property transcends partisanship, as

Technology innovation today is more the result of encouraging investors than inventors. America’s technology talent is ample. It is diverse and dispersed among national labs, research universities and companies, large and small. It’s inadequate investment holding us back in the urgent innovation race with China. And the source of tech investment is less the government

This month, C4IP recognizes Florence Parpart, the stenographer and American inventor who patented the modern refrigerator and the street sweeper. Much about Florence Parpart is a mystery, but her inventions have helped to change the daily lives of many across the globe. Born to a New Jersey family in 1873, Parpart was a stenographer for

Claim: On March 29, the International Trade Commission held a hearing on the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) proposed suspension of Covid-19 therapeutic and diagnostic intellectual property rights by expanding the TRIPS waiver. James Love, director of Knowledge Ecology International, claimed that expanding the waiver would foster increased access to therapeutics and diagnostics — suggesting that

Today is the 24th annual World Intellectual Property Day. The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) established the holiday in 2000 to raise awareness of the ways intellectual property rights — like patents, trademarks, and copyrights — promote creativity and improve our daily lives. Each year, World IP Day centers on a different theme. This year,

C4IP is recognizing Wilbur and Orville Wright, better known as the “Wright Brothers,” for inventing the airplane. The Wright Brothers grew up in Dayton, Ohio, in the late 1800s. Neither brother attended university, and they opted to launch the West Side News, a local newspaper company, in 1889. The two ultimately opened up a bike

Claim: Former Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) alleged that “our innovation economy is groaning under the weight of…thousands of meritless legal actions” brought forth by “patent trolls [wielding] low-quality patents.” Rep. Goodlatte claimed that the country needs significant reforms to stop these “patent trolls” from “generating waste and inefficiencies” and to “make the patent system work

C4IP is recognizing an inventor who paved the way for more people to participate in democracy through his patented voting machine. Roland J. Harp, American inventor and founder of Harp Enterprises, Inc. Harp invented a voting machine that employs audio presentation, allowing visually-impaired and blind individuals – as well as individuals with lower literacy skills

C4IP is recognizing a renowned American inventor who provided cold-weather protection — and altered the course of his hometown — with his patented invention: earmuffs. Chester Greenwood, American inventor and founder of Greenwood’s Ear Protector Factory. Born in Maine, with an affinity for ice skating outdoors, Greenwood was no stranger to winter-weather discomforts — including

The USPTO has launched a new Cancer Moonshot Expedited Examination Pilot Program. The program — which began on February 1, 2023 — expedites the examination of patent applications pertaining to a host of technologies that prevent cancer and cancer mortality. This is a promising measure taken by the Biden administration to encourage IP-based investments in