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EICTA is sending 50 "hightech SME//s" to visit the European Parliament and complain about loss of patent protections. Most of these SME//s are losers of the software patent game. As far as they own any patents at all, these are either business method patents, which their own "Manifesto" says shouldn't be grantable, or patents on solutions involving forces of nature, which are grantable under the Parliament's position of 2003 anyway. At least two of of the SME bosses are high-ranking Microsoft managers. Others are business partners of companies like IBM. Yet EICTA's "SME" lobbying efforts appear to have swayed several formerly critical JURI MEP//s into publicly stating that "the industry", regardless of company size, wants software patents.
