(This article first appeared on IPWatchDog)

In his 2018 State of the Union speech, President Trump placed reducing the price of prescription drugs at the top of his agenda. How can he do this without harming the profit incentive that drive R&D for innovative treatments and cures? The President is correct to focus his attention on the anti-consumer and anti-competitive regulatory environment. This is a crucial pivot from recent bi-partisan attacks on our patent system, attacks which have destroyed the incentive for innovation in pharmaceuticals as well as every other industry.

But the first major ruling under the new Director of the USPTO Andrei Iancu fell back to attacking patents. On February 23, three administrative patent judges of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) issued a sweeping opinion that sovereign immunity does not apply to PTAB proceedings and that the agency can revoke a patent right without consent or participation of the patent owner. This is the latest and possibly most extreme example of agency overreach in the 7 year history of the PTAB under the American Invents Act.

To read the rest Josh Malone‘s Article, click here.