The Tillis Amendment Should Be Removed from the One Big, Beautiful Bill Act

The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, a sweeping piece of must-pass legislation, is moving through the U.S. Senate under budget reconciliation. These omnibus bills often become vehicles for advancing pet projects and rewarding campaign donors. Lawmakers can quietly attach provisions that benefit allies as long as they’re not controversial enough to jeopardize the larger package allowing […]

SPARK US Innovation Opposes PERA: A Call for Amendment to Protect American Innovation

The United States has long been a beacon of innovation, driving global advancements in technology and securing economic and national security through intellectual property protections. However, this leadership is under threat, and SPARK US Innovation, a group dedicated to advancing critical emerging technologies (CET), is sounding the alarm. SPARK opposes the Patent Eligibility Restoration Act of […]

Reinventing Patent Quality: A NIST-Based Program for the USPTO 

The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is the cornerstone of America’s innovation engine, issuing patents that fuel technological advancement and economic growth. However, perceptions of poor patent quality, driven by vague claim language, inconsistent examinations, costly litigation, and occasional bad rulings by the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) or the […]

Weaponized Fairness: Big Tech’s Dirty Secret in the U.S. Patent System

There’s a nasty little game going on in the U.S. patent system—one that no one in Washington seems willing to talk about. Big Tech corporations, the same ones screaming the loudest about imaginary “patent trolls” and “bad patents”, are quietly withholding prior art from the USPTO. Then, when those patents get issued, they turn around […]

How Big Tech Used the Supreme Court to Kill Competition

In 2014, the U.S. Supreme Court handed Big Tech a loaded weapon. They called it Alice v. CLS Bank (Alice). Framed as a fix for so-called “bad patents,” the decision was pitched as a way to stop vague, overly broad ideas from getting patent protection. What it actually did was gut the patent system for […]

China’s Warm Water Port is the U.S. Supreme Court

On March 21, 2025, the U.S. Supreme Court gathered for one of its Conference meetings, where the Justices quietly decide which cases to hear and which to dismiss. Their decisions rest largely on memos from clerks—young attorneys who wield enormous influence over which issues make it to the highest court in the land. One such […]

The Irony of Justice Roberts and the Reality of Rule 36 Affirmances

The American judiciary is supposed to be the last refuge for those seeking justice, a place where the rule of law reigns supreme, immune from political games and corporate influence. But in reality, it’s a rigged system, tilted in favor of powerful multinational corporations and indifferent to the struggles of startups, inventors, and everyday Americans. […]

The RESTORE Patents Act Uniquely Handicaps American Innovation

In 2007 the United States led the world in 60 out of 64 technologies critical to our economic and national security.  However, warning signs emerged when it was reported that China accounted for 48% of global Artificial Intelligence (AI) startup funding in 2017, surpassing the U.S., which held 38%.  By March 2023, China had taken […]