Welcome back to our course on protecting business innovations via patent.
Now that you've gotten a patent,
you might ask, what does it do for me?
Where is it valid, among other things?
That's an important consideration because patents are only valid in one jurisdiction.
This, for example, is very different from copyright which is
valid globally. Patents are not.
In jurisdiction, you even might not be the same as country.
So sometimes, you may need more than one patent even within
a single country to cover your rights across all of that country.
There are some international patent treaties that
give you some rights that may cross country boundaries,
and there are at least one example of a jurisdiction that covers more than one country,
as well as jurisdictions that are in less than one country.
So, jurisdiction is the important factor to consider, not just country.
There are also some international patent applications where you may be
able to apply for patents in more than one country at the same time.
But the general rule is: one patent, one country.
You only get a patent that can be
enforced in the country or jurisdiction that it was issued in.
It's only valid here.
So, for example, a patent issued in Japan is not valid in America and not valid in China.
You can say, "I have a patent in USA.
You can't make that in China." Yes, you can.
You can make it anywhere other than in USA.
You have a US patent that only protects you in the US.
It does not protect you in any other country.
You need a patent in those countries to protect you in another country.
You must apply for a patent in
every country that you care about in terms of manufacturing,
distribution, sales, or usage of your product.
You must get a patent everywhere you want
any protection because a patent is only valid in one place, where it was issued.
It's only enforceable in one country.
If you get a patent in Japan,
you can only sue in Japan.
You can't go to court in the US and say, "Well,
I have this Japanese patent and there's an American company violating it in Japan.
Since they're in America, I want to sue them in
America because I might get better judgments."
No, you can only protect your product in Japan,
and you can only sue in Japan.
A patent is only valid or enforceable in one country.
Courts will not allow cases related to patents from other countries.
Not interested.
That's the other country's courts.
You have no rights to enforce
any restrictions or to bring a lawsuit in any other country.
Sometimes, jurisdiction is not the same as country.
For example, in China,
we look at Hong Kong as being part of China.
Macau is part of China.
Some people view Taiwan as part of China.
Admittedly, there's a little bit of a political debate or question about that.
But clearly, from a jurisdictional point of view,
these are four separate jurisdictions.
There are four separate patents.
There are four separate set of courts.
There are four separate governments.
They operate independently in the area
of intellectual property protection particularly for patents.
One country, four systems, four different patents.
In some cases, you can have jurisdiction across countries like, for example,
Europe has recently passed laws allowing cross-country patents within Europe,
patents that are issued by the EU itself,
which can be applied in each country as if it was issued in a country.
In that case, the jurisdiction is the EU, not the country.
You can also get a patent in individual country.
So that's kind of an interesting twist on jurisdiction,
not the same as country.
International patent treaties do provide
some international protections for patent holders in different contexts and rights,
and they say things like,
"Patent holders must be treated the same regardless of nationality."
So, when you say,
as a jury in a case,
as a jury did recently,
"We want to punish this foreign company and
show that you can't mess with our companies this way.
We're going to send a strong signal."
No, that is not allowed.
You cannot do that.
That is against international treaties and against both the US law and international law.
Doesn't mean juries don't try to do it but it is illegal.
You also can't limit your technology based on a certain type of technology and say,
"Well, they're not good at that technology.
So, we don't want to issue any patents because it would all be foreign companies apply."
No, you can't do that.
International patent treaties also say that we can have
application processes which are different for domestic and foreign.
We say, once you get a patent,
you have to be treated the same.
But before you get a patent,
we can charge different fees,
and we can even have a different review process for locals versus foreigners.
But once you get the patent, everybody's the same.
So, it does allow some preferential treatment and process and fees for
countries to charge for locals to apply for a patent and get through the process faster,
easier, sort of like in-state
school tuition in the US versus out-of-state school tuition.
You have some preference or bias towards people of one group or
population who may be part of the tax-paying group that support your government.
International patent applications are also allowed and that there's a new,
relatively not that new,
but a process by which you can apply for patents in multiple countries at the same time.
It's one application, one review process,
multiple countries issue the patents.
Each country issues their own patent,
each country receives fees for the patents separately,
but there's a centralized patent review.
So, it's one application,
multiple patents, multiple country approval.
In this international patent application,
there are 152 countries worldwide that have agreed to
be part of this international patent treaty and agreement.
US is not in that group.
US stands apart.
And America says,
"We don't want to have the same review.
We don't trust anybody else to review patents the way we review patents.
We're going to do it on our own."
Now, that's okay.
But one of the implications of that is it's taking longer to get
patents approved in America partly because it's less efficient.
There's less economies of scale than there's global sharing.
Small countries may be able to benefit or
leverage this global review process and get patents done more quickly.
The US says, "We're going to do it independently," but they don't even
necessarily fund the Patent Trademark Office as much as they should.
And so, this is kind of a struggle in America right now.
"We're going to do it alone but we're going to do it expensively and slowly."
Where are patents valid?
Summary is: one patent, one jurisdiction.
Jurisdiction usually is the same as country but not always.
International patent treaties normally give you some rights as a patent holder
but they generally do not allow you to have
any patent protection at all from one country to another.
And international patent applications do help improve
efficiency and reduce cost of applying for multiple patents.
And they work well for most countries in the world,
but not in the United States.
That's it. Thank you.
Look forward to seeing you in our next session.
