On September 7, 2007 the House of Representatives passed HR 1908, the Patent Reform Act of 2007, with a vote of 220 aye - 175 nay - 37 not voting. There were several amendments that were also passed and included in the bill. Even though the bill passed while the university community has lingering concerns, this vote is still considered positive because of the narrowness of the passage which might influence what occurs on the Senate side with their similar bill, S. 1145. Many individuals spent countless hours trying to ensure that the U.S. maintains a strong patent system. Special acknowledgement and thanks to Andy Cohn, Chair of the AUTM Subcommittee on Patent Reform, for his significant efforts on behalf of the university community.

One of the amendments included the one from Rep. Tammy Baldwin, WI to delete the prior user rights (PUR) provision and replace it with a study of PUR in other countries making it similar to the Senate bill. AUTM sent a letter to Rep Baldwin and leaders of the House and its Judiciary committee in support of this amendment which was ultimately adopted in the managers amendment which passed on September 7, 2007.

With regard to the venue provision that would force the patent holder to file an infringement suit in the home district of the infringing company. While this provision is inappropriate in general, the AUTM Board of Trustees felt the need to conduct damage control to ensure that most of our membership was not harmed in the process of venue reform. The AUTM Board of Trustees sent a letter to request expansion of the exemption to also include non-profit organizations that serve primarily as the patent and licensing organization for a university. This protects non-profit research foundations, such as WARF and Purdue Foundation, but not necessarily organizations that also conduct licensing for universities, such as RCT. There is still a need to expand the exemption in the Senate bill to include non-profit research institutes such as Scripps and Salk.

While there are still other issues (e.g. inequitable conduct), the remaining major issue in the House bill is apportionment of damages. The university community has been and will continue to work with Senate staffers on seeking improvements to the patent reform legislation.