Press Release - August 17, 2006

Community Patent Review Initiative Welcomes HP as Lead Sponsor and Participant

The Community Patent Review Initiative, a partnership with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to streamline and improve the patent application review process, today welcomed HP as a lead sponsor and participant. As an active supporter of this innovative pilot project, HP has committed to consent to community peer review of some of its published patent applications by allowing third parties to submit commentary explaining the relevance of the prior art they provide to the patent office.

Professor Beth Noveck, Director of the Institute for Information Law & Policy at New York Law School, thanked HP for its support of the patent initiative and commented that the company’s endorsement of the project signifies another important step toward "realizing the goal of improving the efficiency and quality of the patent examination process."

Said Jeff Fromm, Vice President, Deputy General Counsel & Director of Intellectual Property for HP, "The community patent project takes advantage of today’s community-based technology to improve the quality of U.S. patents in a manner that is aligned with the basic tenets of the patent system. This initiative does precisely what Thomas Jefferson intended the patent system to do by reaching out to the scientific community for information and access to prior art, and HP is pleased to be a partner in this effort."

Other sponsors and participants in the Community Patent Review Initiative include IBM, Microsoft and Red Hat.

For press inquiries, contact Nancy Guida at nguida@nyls.edu.