Blog 9: Why No One Likes Patent Trolls

Hi everyone,

Today I would like to talk about the cons of patent trolls and how the abuse of the patent system bugs out inventors and economy at large. In folktales, trolls terrifies children and townspeople. Likewise, in today's society and online, trolls abuse the effective usage of intellectual property. Yes, there is nothing wrong in policy or principle with an inventor licensing his ideas, but not manufacturing any products. Yet, most of the times, many trolls are not genuine inventors. They are economic seekers who only go after the chances that can earn them money. Furthermore, the lengthy and expensive lawsuits over patent infringement that many patent trolls attack for drag the economy and innovation as a whole. 

Patent trolls are not recent issue; they were already considered as a problem in 1890s. An American lawyer plagiarized the idea of improving road-engine from the exhibit at 1872 Centennial Convention, but was awarded a patent and sued many other car manufacturers for infringing on "his" patent. He forced them to pay him royalties. Similarly, there are a lot of patent portfolio mangers that simply acquire patent to make money by suing economically-lacking companies or inventors. This economically-seeking practice has aroused many other companies to act similarly, and the number of patent-related lawsuits has risen more then ten-fold since 2000. Shockingly, the most litigious patent trolls file more than one lawsuit a week. 

Economists say that patent trolls may benefit by helping to transfer the profit made by patents from manufacturers to inventors. However, the new research found that inventors only get 5% of their invention value after winning the patent trolls cases. The rest of the money goes to lawyers and NPEs. 

Due to the strength of NPE lobbyists, no serious reforms are likely to be passed on and the solution for paten trolls seem to be ambiguous and not clearly solved.