There were 6,536 new patents issued at the US Patent Office for the week of July 6, 2021, not counting the Design and Reissue patents.
Below is the breakdown by states.
Some of the top Chinese entities that are issued new US patents almost every week.
The table below are some of the top Assignees of the week.
The top ten longest time to patent grant for the week. Cerner Innovation, Inc comes in first place with a total of 5,613 days from filing to issuance. The patent is titled “Computerized system and method for modifying components of healthcare orders which are associated into cross-phase groups”.
The top ten shortest time to patent grant for the week was between 70 and 126 days. Well done to the teams!
Blockchain patents continue to be issued at a blistering pace with 31 this week. Advanced New Technologies was issued 12 new blockchain patents this week. The next closes was IBM with four. Alipay and Bank of America both added two each.
There were just five new electric vehicle patents.
There were eight Lidar related patents issued this week. Newcomer $AEVA added another patent. Waymo continues to add to their patent holdings and now has over 300 Lidar related patents.
Patent Rapid Fire
I wanted to try a new section for this week’s newsletter. A quick run through of new patents issued to public companies, questions related to patent issues that I am asked on Twitter or email, and my thoughts.
First up:
Parkervision $PRKR has been involved in patent litigation with a variety of parties for over a decade with little to show for it. Its firmly in my no trade zone. There might be an opening for a trade on the news, but I would expect it to get sold off quickly. I do wish the management team well and hope they can finally land a large verdict/settlement in the future.
Network-1 $NTIP currently has a lot of moving parts. I have owned the stock for years at this point and think the CEO has done a pretty good job. NTIP currently has a retrial with HP scheduled for the first week of August 2021 and a Markman Order / Summary Judgment due any moment in their litigation with Google. I would prefer to wait out any verdict and decisions from these cases before making any new purchases. They are also sitting on a newer portfolio not involved in any litigation (Nix/M2M) they are continuing to build and add new applications/patents that might have a lot of value in the future.
Next we come to Lightwave Logic $LWLG:
First off I am a huge fan of Michael Lebby the CEO of Lightwave Logic. I think he has done a very good job expanding the R&D and intellectual property in the company. I was buried in underwater shares that all of a sudden became a 8x/9x in a matter of a few weeks. I took the sudden liquidity and I am extremely happy.
I view the company’s valuation unsustainable over a Billion dollars with the current fundamentals and a lack of commercialization or large tech company partnership. The history of the OTC and small market companies is littered with technology booms and busts. LWLG is trying to solve a decades long problem and it would be extremely rare for the answer to be hidden in a small cap company. The company has been active at investor and industry conferences, which is the likely reason for the increase in price and volume. There are major expectations that something big will be announced in the near term future, but I am not exactly sure what that might be. I will continue to monitor the news flow, patent filings, and SEC filings to see if I am proven wrong. I would love to buy back in if the technology is adopted by a large technology company, even at higher prices.
Progenity $PROG is involved in patent litigation with Natera $NTRA in Western Texas. A Markman opinion was issued on June 2, 2021 in favor of Natera. A jury trial is scheduled in the Western District of Texas March 21, 2022.
There were six Inter Partes Reviews filed. Three were instituted, two were not instituted and another is pending. Natera alleges Progenity’s Innatal Prenatal Screen is infringing their patents. Natera is looking for willful damages, attorney fees, and an injunction. I will have to review the SEC filings again but I believe Innatal Prenatal Screen accounts for a substantial amount of revenue for Progenity. I will try to follow up in next week’s issue.
Natera filed a second patent case in the Northern District of Texas which is stayed. Progenity filed a Declaratory Judgment action in the Sourthern District of California, which is also stayed pending a Motion to Dismiss decision in the Western District of Texas.
That is all for the week. Any feedback on the “rapid fire” section is greatly appreciated.
Thumbs up on the rapid fire section! Following up on NTIP: did you look into the Iliad Biotech stake and what it might be worth? I believe they have a pertussis vaccine trial in Phase 2 but I have no idea how to value them.