On March 12, 2014, the Chief Counsel of the SBA Office of Advocacy Winslow Sargeant weighed in on the Patent Reform issue with a letter to Chairwoman of the Senate Small Business Committee Mary Landrieu listing some of the concerns that small businesses have with the proposed patent reform legislation in Congress, and describing how these changes in patent law could hurt small businesses and stifle innovation. He highlighted a number of problems that would be created by the proposed legislation, including Mandatory Fee-Shifting, Pay-to-Play legal requirements, enhanced pleading requirements, and eliminating post-grant review estoppel.
Advocacy concluded that the proposed changes would “tip the scales too far against small innovators while not adequately discouraging bad actors from exploiting the Patent system.” They encourage Congress to take a closer look at what consequences the reform legislation would have for small businesses.