Other: Community

September 22, 2014

USPTO Launches Redesigned KIDS! Web Pages

WASHINGTON – New resource offers intellectual property education resources for parents, teachers, and students of all ages.

The U.S. Department of Commerce’s United States Patent and Trademark Office (“USPTO”) recently announced the launch of its newly redesigned KIDS! Web pages aimed to encourage students of all ages to learn about the importance of intellectual property (“IP”) creation and protection. In addition to featuring young inventor profiles, activities, and videos, the pages also offer curricula that link Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (“STEM”) education to IP and innovation through downloadable lesson plans, hands-on instructions for building inventions, USPTO career information and other useful resources.

“The USPTO looks to our children – the doers, makers, and tinkerers of the future – to reimagine the world and, as the Constitution calls for, ‘to promote the progress of Science and the useful Arts’ like never before,” said Michelle K. Lee, Deputy Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Deputy Director of the USPTO. “As schools across the country ramp up their STEM programming, we look forward to putting even more tools in teachers’ hands that will ensure our next generation is well-versed in concepts of making, inventing, and creating the high-value intellectual property that drives our economy.” USPTO’s updated KIDS! Web pages also feature coloring pages designed to introduce younger students to patents and trademarks, an audio library of trademarked sounds, upcoming event listings, and other challenging activities to help encourage and inspire future generations of inventors. For more information, please visit www.uspto.gov/kids.

September 11, 2014

Loretta Rush Sworn in as Chief Justice of Indiana Supreme Court

By Overhauser Law Offices, LLC

Indianapolis, Indiana – Loretta H. Rush (pictured)succeeds former Chief Justice Brent Dickson as Chief

Justice of the Indiana Supreme Court.

Rush was appointed to the Indiana Supreme Court by then-Governor Mitch Daniels in 2012. Prior to her appointment, Rush was elected as a Tippecanoe Superior Court judge, where she served for 14 years. During her tenure as a Tippecanoe judge, Rush assisted with the creation of the county’s Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) program. During that time, she also helped initiate, develop and sustain more than twenty-five youth programs. In 2003, she was named the best juvenile court judge in the state.

September 8, 2014

Apple Entitled to $400M in Samsung Profits, Indiana University Maurer School of Law Professors Say in Amicus Brief

By Overhauser Law Offices, LLC

Bloomington, Indiana – In a highly publicized intellectual property case involving the design features of smartphones and tablets, the Federal Circuit will decide whether to force Samsung to pay Apple nearly $400 million – Samsung’s total profits on products that infringed Apple’s design patents. Though several high-profile academics have lined up in support of Samsung, Apple’s position on the total profits rule should prevail, according to Indiana University Maurer School of Law experts who have filed an amicus curiae brief in the case.

Apple and Samsung have been battling in dozens of complex intellectual property infringement cases in several countries. At trial in one of the U.S. cases, a jury found that several Samsung devices infringed Apple’s design patents, and awarded Apple all of Samsung’s profits on those devices. On appeal, Samsung is arguing that it should only be required to give up the portion of its profits that can be linked directly to the infringing design features of the products, a theory called “apportionment.”

“Congress debated this same question over a century ago and rejected apportionment,” said Mark D. Janis, the Robert A. Lucas Chair of Law and director of the Center for Intellectual Property Research at the IU Maurer School of Law. He explained that in the mid-1880s, the Supreme Court decided two cases involving carpet designs in which the infringers made thousands of dollars in profits, but the design patent holder was awarded only 6 cents because it failed to prove how much of the profit was attributable to the carpets’ appearance.

July 31, 2014

Indiana University Maurer School of Law Added to USPTO Law School Clinic Certification Pilot Program

By Overhauser Law Offices, LLC

Indianapolis, Indiana – The U.S. Department of Commerce’s United States Patent and Trademark Office (“USPTO”) yesterday announced the selection of 19 law schools, including Indiana University Maurer School of Law, that will join the USPTO’s Law School Clinic Certification Pilot Program this fall. Indiana University Maurer School of Law (pictured) and four other law schools will join both the Patent and Trademark portions of the Program, four law schools will join the Patent portion of the Program, and ten law schools will join the Trademark portion of the Program. These law schools join the 28 law schools currently participating in the Program.

The selection committees chose these schools based on their solid intellectual property curricula, pro bono services to the public, and community networking and outreach. The Program enables law students to practice patent and/or trademark law before the USPTO under the guidance of an approved faculty clinic supervisor.

“Expanding the USPTO’s Law School Clinic Certification Pilot Program will provide more students – future intellectual property lawyers – with the real-world experience and tools crucial to tackle the complexities of today’s IP law landscape,” said Deputy Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Deputy Director of the USPTO Michelle K. Lee. “The addition of law schools and students in the program will also increase pro bono representation to American businesses and entrepreneurs, thereby helping ensure they have the resources to grow, create jobs and compete globally.”

July 21, 2014

IUPUI Research Commercialization and Outreach on the Rise

By Overhauser Law Offices, LLC

Indianapolis, Indiana – The Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis Innovation-to-Enterprise Initiative, which supports faculty and students as they turn research and product development into profitable commercial ventures, is resulting in a sharp increase in inventions, patents and start-up business concepts.

The initiative was created to enable the campus community to reach its full potential in research commercialization and economic development, and to provide opportunities for students to learn about discovery, innovation and enterprise creation, while developing entrepreneurial and business skills.

In 2013, IUPUI collaborated with almost 200 companies and organizations in developing over 500 student internships and community-engagement research and service projects supported by just under $1 million in direct and in-kind support from IUPUI and its community partners. A recent collaboration contributed to improving the quality of life and healthy habits on the Near Eastside of Indianapolis through the realization of 17 projects that addressed dental care, public health, urban produce gardens, fitness care and career development.

May 29, 2014

IU McKinney Welcomes Internationally Renowned IP Scholar to Law Faculty

By Overhauser Law Offices, LLC

Professor Xuan-Thao Nguyen, a professor at the Southern Methodist University Dedman School of Law, will join the faculty and lead the Center for Intellectual Property Law and Innovation at the IU Robert H. McKinney School of Law. She will join Indiana University in August 2014.

Professor Nguyen is internationally recognized for her teaching and scholarship in the areas of intellectual property, secured transactions, bankruptcy, licensing, and taxation in her teaching and scholarship. She has co-authored several treatises and casebooks and around 30 law review articles in the areas of intellectual property, secured financing, bankruptcy, and taxation.

“It is an honor and privilege to be the Gerald L. Bepko Chair in Law and Director of the Center for Intellectual Property and Innovation at the Indiana University Robert H. McKinney School of Law,” Professor Nguyen said. “I look forward to working with my colleagues, students, alumni and friends in building a vibrant Center for all and a special home for training future leaders around the world in IP and related fields.”

April 8, 2014

Center for Intellectual Property Law and Innovation Holds Third Annual Symposium

By Overhauser Law Offices, LLC

Indianapolis, Indiana – On April 10, 2014, the Robert H. McKinney School of Law will host McKinney Photo.jpg “IP Jurisprudence in the New Technological Epoch: The Judiciary’s Role in the Age of Biotechnology and Digital Media.” The program will run from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and will provide 6.5 hours of continuing legal education.

Speaker: Robert A. Armitage, Consultant, IP Strategy & Policy

Location: Wynne Courtroom and Atrium, Inlow Hall, 530 W. New York Street, Indianapolis, Indiana

September 30, 2013

Government Shutdown May Soon Affect USPTO and Federal Courts

By Overhauser Law Offices, LLC

Washington, D.C. — The U.S. Patent Office (“USPTO”) and federal courts may be affected by a government shutdown, which will begin tomorrow if Congress does not enact a continuing resolution to fund government operations today.

The federal court system will not be affected immediately. During the first 10 business days of a lapse in appropriations, the judiciary will use available fee and no-year balances to pay judges and court employees, and to maintain court operations. Courts will continue to operate, but court personnel have been instructed to conserve funding as much as possible by delaying or deferring expenses that are not critical to the performance of their constitutional responsibilities.

After the 10-day period, if there is still no appropriation, the judiciary will operate under the terms of the Anti-Deficiency Act, which allows “essential work” to continue during a lapse in appropriations. Among the definitions of “essential work” are powers exercised under the Constitution, which include activities to support the exercise of Article III judicial powers, specifically the resolution of cases.

May 17, 2013

Purdue University Celebrates Innovation

By Overhauser Law Offices, LLC

Lafayette, Ind. — Purdue University students are creating and patenting products while pursuing their degrees. Purdue is celebrating the inventiveness of five of those students: Julia Alspaugh, Zachary Amodt, Sean Connell, Andrew Glassman and Anne Dye Zakrajsek.

Julia Alspaugh, a mechanical engineer in her second year as a master’s student, researches biomedicine. She says, “I see mechanical engineering as a broad field that analyzes the world’s processes and how the machinery and technology that makes them work can be simplified and improved.”

Julia is part of a large, interdisciplinary team seeking numerous patents related to the use of novel, resorbable biomaterials to create fixation devices for next-generation orthopedic devices, such as the plates, pins and screws used to set broken limbs or repair damaged tissues and joints.

“These devices would provide support while the bone and joint healed, for example, then degrade within a few years without leaving any foreign or potentially toxic materials in the body,” she explains. “It’s a similar concept to the dissolving stitches now used in many dental surgeries, but on a larger and more complex scale.”

For Julia, the most surprising thing she’s encountered in the patent process is unrelated to engineering or biomedicine. “Learning how to make sure what we are working on is novel and patentable has been more challenging than expected,” she says. “It may be an awesome new technology, but we also have to keep in mind its marketability. It requires communication between many different people with different interests and ways of doing things.”

Zachary Amodt dropped out of school to join the military after September 11, 2001. Ten years later, he returned and is now holding a provisional patent inspired by his experience as a combat medic in war zones all over the world.