Stakeholders agree with examiners of the EPO, who warned about the decline in patent quality (in the petition below) while media barely paid any attention (only three blogs/sites in the UK and maybe one in Germany covered it)

Summary: WIPR's poll shows that "just 10% of WIPR readers disagreed with the claims made in the examiners’ petition." (above)

THE quality of patents at the USPTO is being improved. The EPO, which traditionally boasted about its superior patent quality, went in the opposite direction. It was a conscious choice and one that a crooked President is responsible for. Cui bono? Ask Team UPC and their patent-trolling clients. Low-quality patents are lucrative 'business' to them.

"Cui bono? Ask Team UPC and their patent-trolling clients."According to this poll whose results were published yesterday by a site which specifically targets patent/copyright/trademark law firms:

WIPR readers believe that the quality of the European Patent Office (EPO) patent is endangered by the demands of current management, according to our latest survey.

On March 16, WIPR reported that 924 patent examiners at the EPO sent a petition to the Administrative Council, which supervises the EPO, ahead of its annual meeting this month. The petition said that patent quality is being jeopardised by the demands of the EPO’s leadership.

WIPR also reported on an open letter from the EPO’s Central Staff Committee which claimed that the examination of patent applications hasn’t become any easier, or less time consuming, than some years ago.

“Therefore, the only way to achieve such objectives will be, for most of the examiners affected, to spend much less time for each single patent application,” claimed the letter.

The latest WIPR survey found that just 10% of WIPR readers disagreed with the claims made in the examiners’ petition.

This is not a scientific survey, but it does serve to show that the sentiment among patent professionals is similar to that which prevails at the EPO. ⬆