Changes

The PATENT Act was introduced on April 29, 2015 by Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and referred to the Senate Committee on the Judiciary. On September 8, 2015, the bill was placed on the Senate Legislative Calendar under General Orders. Currently the bill has 6 cosponsors (3 Republicans and 3 Democrats). The full title of the bill is "A bill to amend title 35, United States Code, and the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act to make improvements and technical corrections, and for other purposes."

The House Innovation Act and Senate Patent Act are very similar; both acts address abusive litigation through “increased transparency, more limited discovery, heightened pleading standards, and ‘loser pays’ fee shifting”. However, there has been a delay in the passing of the bills because of controversy surrounging the shifting of attorney fees. Fee shifting was originally suggested as a way to incentivize small firms and businesses that were being unfairly accused of patent infringement to bring the case to court, so that they would not have to pay their attorney fees. However, there have been arguments stating that fee shifting would actually increase the settlement rate of small businesses being accused of patent infringement, because they don’t want to take the risk of losing and paying for the winner’s attorneys’ fees, in addition to their own. [http://www.bna.com/debate-patent-reform-n17179934625/ (Bloomberg BNA)]