PTO: One million applications backlogged and climbing

Federal Drive

PTO: One million applications backlogged and climbing

The Patent and Trademark office faces a backlog of more than a million applications. Now Congress is hashing out a bill aimed at shrinking that. It’s called...

Federal News Network Staff

April 28, 2009 9:37 am

< a min read

wfedstaff | June 2, 2015 8:28 pm

Download audio

The Patent and Trademark office faces a backlog of more than a million applications. Now Congress is hashing out a bill aimed at shrinking that. It’s called the Patent Reform Act of 2009. But Professor Mark Lemley believes the bill needs to go further. Lemley is director of the Stanford Program in Law, Science and Technology. He says the agency’s troubles have deep roots.