Week 4, Post 2 — America's chronically excessive IP laws

America's current system of patent protection might be doing more harm then good. This system of patent protection is a "drag on GDP" and is a dead weight on an economy that is about to grow.

More and stronger patents, instead of giving rise to productivity, is doing the opposite— it's stalling productivity and innovation. It is being used to protect incumbent major companies from new competitors. This leads to a sense of monopoly, which in the end, tends to lead to little innovation and even lesser progress in terms of gross domestic product.

In 1983, US issued about 60,000 patents. In 2010, that number climbed to 244,000— a four fold increase. However, R&D spending still stagnates around 2.5% of GDP, and total factor productivity is actually declining.

Innovators, instead of innovating, are worrying about legal issues and patent trolls. This instillation of fear prevents them from working towards building better technologies and innovations.

Intellectual monopoly, while having its benefits, also has a lot of negative effects, that is harming the economy.

Article: http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-02-24/how-patent-laws-are-stifling-american-growth

Week 4, Post 1 — Patent Wars hit all time high

Patent wars hit an all time high in 2012, with a record number of applications made for international computing patents.

With smartphones and tablet companies, coming in the news for their patent related misbehaviors, the value of patents has upped in the last year. This was responsible for a 19% rise in patents.

Incidents like the Apple-Samsung Intellectual Property lawsuit, where Samsung had to pay $1bn as charges to Apple for infringement, or the case where Google bought Motorola for $12.5bn, has lead to the values of patents going up, and more awareness and usefulness being seen in the use of patents to protect intellectual property.

Virtually every major company in the consumers electronics market is involved with Intellectual property litigation with at least one of it's main competitors.

Companies are arming themselves with more patents than ever before.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9e17e868-66fe-11e2-a805-00144feab49a.html#axzz2Lt1m8vXe

Week 3, Post 2 — Facebook sued for "Like" button

Facebook is being sued for its Like button — a concept that Rembrandt Social Media claims belongs to Dutch entrepreneur Joannes Josef Everardus van Der Meer's primitive social networking site called Surfbook. Der Meer is supposed to have patented the Like button in 1998.

Rembrandt Social Media, to whom Der Meer left all his patents after his death, is the one suing Facebook. They claim that Rembrandt's patents represent an important foundation of social media as we know it. They claim that Facebook's success is dependent on Surfbook's concept.

This case highlights the problem in today's world regarding Intellectual Property. Companies tend to sue other companies when they themselves lose their creative juice. Patent wars has become just another way for companies to make money by suing others. Millions of dollars are spent in litigation to do with patent infringement, and companies are now taking advantage of this patent infringement trend that is suddenly rising to make a quick profit.

Article: http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/business-living/2013/feb/22/dislike-facebook-sued-patent-infringement/

Week 3, Post 1 — Apple loses use over iPhone name.

The patent war has become more of a game. Apple recently lost it's right to use the "iPhone" name in Brazil to Gradiente Electronica's "iphone".

On February 14th, Brazil's Insittute of Industry Property, the country's main patent regulator, ruled that Apple held no exlusive rights to use the iPhone name to market it's mobile phones. If Apple continued to do so, Gradiente can sue Apple.

Gradiente holds trademarks through 2018 for the iphone moniker, after having registered it in 2000. Apple only unveiled the iPhone name in 2007, a full seven years after.

This is a huge blow for apple, as Brazil is one of its biggest markets. It doesn't help the fact that Apple is being sued by firms in China, Japan, and USA.

Apple has had trouble with Cisco, for the same reason when it initially released the iPhone name.
Apple also has had trouple with the iPad moniker, with China's Proview Shenzhen, to whom Apple had to give $60 Million.

Let's see how Apple gets out of this one.

Week 2, Post 2 — Kodak licences patents for cheap

Eastman Kodak Co. was suffering through bankruptcy. The digital imaging giant was close to shutting off, and disappearing. But what came in handy for them was their extensive and useful patents. So, what did they do? They decided to sell and license of its digital imaging patents for net proceeds of $527 million.

This transaction has helped build the momentum for Kodak to emerge out of bankruptcy midyear. There is not just one company/firm that Kodak has licensed its patents to. In fact, the consortium of firms include, Facebook Inc., Amazon.com Inc., Apple Inc., Google Inc. and Samsung Electronics Co.

However, this deal could have got Kodak a lot more money if the circumstances were different, i.e, if Kodak was not facing bankruptcy, licensing its patents would have fetched it more money. In fact, Kodak was said to have hoped for more than $2 Billion for its patents. However, the fact that Kodak was in distress, meant that they would agree to a lesser amount of money. This fact, as happens often, was taken advantage of, and they consortium of firms got a very good deal on Kodak's patents.

Kodak still has the rights to use it's patents, and is emerging out from bankruptcy.

Article: http://www.rbj.net/article.asp?aID=193922

Week 2, Post 1 — Apple patents everything.

Apple just got granted their 8,368,654th patent in the US.

This time it was for integrated touch sensor and solar assembly— a portable device whose screen would be touch sensitive as well as have a solar sensor panel. 

In an era where smart phones are packing more features than ever, a major limiting factor that's seen is the battery life— and now Apple is trying to fix that.

The patent described the technology as “integrated touch sensor and solar panel configurations that may be used on portable devices, particularly handheld portable devices such as a media player or phone are disclosed. The integrated touch sensor array and solar cell stack-ups may include electrodes that are used both for collecting solar energy and for sensing on a touch sensor array. By integrating both the touch sensors and the solar cell layers into the same stack-up, surface area on the portable device may be conserved. In addition to being used for capacitive sensing, the integrated touch sensor and solar panel configurations may also be used for optical sensing."

Tapping solar energy to power cell phones might be an idea that revolutionizes the phone industry, or is a complete miss. In case solar powered phones do develop, and have a battery life that surpasses all current ones, then the question remains that only Apple will be using this technology, and not any other company.

Thus, if Apple manages to succeed with the implementation of this new technology, its features, along with it's unbeatable and now, eco-friendly technology, will lead to Apple going even further in its race to be the numero uno, with no one to compete against them.

There have been other solar powered phones in the past, notably, Samsung's Blue Earth phone. However, none of them have been an economic success in the market. 

Here's to see if Apple can once again influence the market and create another game changer.

Articles:

http://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/Apple-Granted-Patent-for-New-Solar-Powered-iPhone.html

http://inhabitat.com/samsung-releases-solar-powered-phone/

Week 1, Post 2 — And I'm taking this class, because...

I'm interested in entrepreneurship, and my goal at college is to touch bases on all aspects of creating and starting your own business.

A huge part of starting your own venture, is to deal with intellectual property. Industrial Engineering and Operations Research 190G will help me gain a better understanding of intellectual property, patents and more.

Using wireless cellular devices as a platform to explore patents, this class shall help acquaint me with the technological aspects of patents. I expect to learn and understand issues arising from patents, patent engineering, patent wars, and more.

This class is a step I want to take to equip myself with the knowledge of protecting intellectual property through patents, and it's uses. This will be useful, especially at a time when intellectual property theft and infringement is rampant.

Moreover, the interesting and unconventional syllabus and style of learning in this class intrigued me in to taking it!

Week 1, Post 1 — About Me

Hello, My name is Abhishek! Welcome to my blog!

This blog will outline my work and growth in the class, Industrial Engineering and Operations Research 190G.

Here is a little something about me:

I was born and brought up in Calcutta, India. I first came to the United States of America in Fall '11 as an international student at the University of California, Berkeley. It's been two years, and I love it here!

I intend to major in Business Administration, with minors in Theater (Acting) and Chinese (Mandarin). 

I am interested in entrepreneurship, and the classes, clubs, and activities I'm involved in cohesively work to help strengthen and complement my entrepreneurial abilities.

I currently live in a residential incubator, Agora Startup House, and live and work with other budding student entrepreneurs. 

I mentor freshmen in areas of social entrepreneurship through this student organization, Compass Fellowship. This is one of my greatest passions as this enables a two way exchange of information, and I learn from my mentees as much, if not more than what I teach them.

I'm also very passionate about theater. I've been acting since I was 5 years old, and I'm still involved in the theater scene at Berkeley. I plan to minor in Acting.

An interesting fact about me is that I plan to finish learning proficiently the 4 most spoken languages in the world before I graduate— Mandarin, Spanish, English, and Hindi.