FFII: CCIA Warns of Americanization of European Patent System

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In a press release Ed Black from CCIA reaffirms his views presented on the 1 June EPP conference: Europe should not make the same mistake as the US. CCIA is a mostly American association of computer and communications industry firms.

(Copy on their own website)

CCIA Press release

For Immediate Release June 30, 2005

For further information contact:

• Ed Black

  President & CEO, CCIA eblack att ccianet.org Office: 202-783-0070 Mobile: 202-297-2242 Will Rodger Director of Public Policy wrodger att ccianet.org Office: 202-783-0070 x 105

CCIA Warns of Americanization of European Patent System

With the European Parliament poised to vote on the controversial software patent directive, Ed Black, President & CEO of the Computer & Communications Industry, today warned of the “Americanization” of the European patent system.

“Supporters of the Council’s Common Position argue that the directive would draw the line against software patents,” Black said, “but you only have to look at the Commission’s original case for the directive (the 1997 Green Paper and the 1999 Communication) to see that the directive was motivated by a misguided desire to emulate the U.S. patent system.

He added: “Look who is supporting the directive: the most dominant software companies and the trade associations they fund.” He noted that SAP, the dominant European business software company, just published a full-page ad in European Voice, urging the Parliament to support the Council’s Common Position.

“What few in Europe realize,” he said, “is that a fierce struggle over patent reform is taking place before the U.S. Congress. In recent years many corporate stakeholders, entrepreneurial inventors and consumer groups have come to understand that the US system is seriously broken, especially in the software/ICT areas. The ICT sector is pitted against drugs and biotechnology. Software suffers the worst failings of an inflated patent system, with the fewest benefits.”

Although the European Patent Convention supposedly does not allow patents on computer programs as such, the European Patent Office has, nevertheless, issued some 30,000 to 50,000 patents, the vast majority to firms outside of Europe. The European Parliament passed numerous amendments on the first reading of the Directive that wisely limited patents to conventional material inventions (although software could be a part of the invention). However, the Council reasserted the Commission’s version of the directive.

Said Black: “It makes no sense to validate the enormous volume of patents just because the EPO issued them to those who asked for them. If the Directive is not appropriately modified, it will result in an explosion of software patents and a restraint on truly valuable innovation. Software patents will not increase the innovation efforts of software companies. However, it will benefit some large companies amassing huge patent portfolios, “patent trolls,” and all lawyers. But they create many losers, not only among developers and contractors, but also all the way down the value chain to major IT users and consumers. Until the problem of sky-high administrative and transaction costs of the patent can be resolved and the additional problems peculiar to software can be addressed, nobody should contemplate making development of good software more difficult, costly, and uncertain than it already is.”

On Wednesday, the Parliament once again faces a vast array of proposed amendments. Black commented, “!MEPs face conflicting evidence and wildly inconsistent advice from lobbyists and fellow !MEPs. Unfortunately, the Commission did not do its job in analyzing and framing the problem. This is not just about patents, this is about the future of software, the nature of innovation and competition in the knowledge economy, and the future of the information society.”

CCIA’s analysis, Drawing the Line(s) in the Debate over Software Patents, was issued last week. It is available on the CCIA website at

http://ccianet.org/papers/Patent%20rpt.pdf

CCIA is an international, nonprofit association of computer and communications industry firms, representing a broad cross section of the industry. CCIA is dedicated to preserving full, free and open competition throughout its industry. Our members employ nearly a million workers and generate annual revenues in excess of $250 billion.