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The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) today unveiled a new web-based intellectual property (IP) marketplace platform, Patents 4 Partnerships, to provide the public with a user-friendly, searchable repository of patents and published patent applications related to the COVID-19 pandemic that are indicated as available for licensing.
The new platform will facilitate the voluntary licensing and commercialization of innovations in a variety of key technologies, and help disseminate valuable patent information.
As President Donald J. Trump noted in his Proclamation on World Intellectual Property Day, 2020: “The importance of intellectual property has never been more apparent than it is now, as we continue the ongoing battle against the coronavirus.”
Patents 4 Partnerships may contribute toward this battle by helping to bring to the marketplace new products and technologies for the prevention, treatment, and diagnosis of COVID-19. In the future, the platform may be expanded to include other technologies.
“Patents 4 Partnerships is a meeting place that enables patent owners who want to license their IP rights to connect with the individuals and businesses who can turn those rights into solutions for our health and wellbeing,” said Andrei Iancu, Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director of the USPTO. “With an initial focus on COVID-19, the platform shows how innovation can contribute to the nation’s response to this critical health emergency.”
Patents 4 Partnerships allows users to search and sort information in a variety of easy-to-use ways, including by keyword, inventor name, assignee and issue date. At launch, its contents have been drawn from a variety of public sources, including the USPTO, the Federal Laboratory Consortium for Technology Transfer (FLC Business), the AUTM Innovation Marketplace (AIM), universities, and a number of federal agencies, including the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Energy, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Department of Defense and the Department of Veterans Affairs databases.
Users are invited to send comments through the link provided on the main page of the platform. IP owners are invited to submit additional technologies that they believe are related to the COVID-19 crisis.
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