IP Leaders Tell Congress, AI Masters Attendees, It’s Past Time for a Solid U.S. Innovation Strategy

The U.S. House of Representatives Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property, and the Internet held a hearing on Wednesday. On the same day, the final panel speakers for IPWatchdog’s AI Masters discussed many of the same issues raised at the hearing. The overwhelming conclusion on both panels is that the US needs a new plan when it comes to her IP protection in cutting. The edge technology sector where China is increasingly overtaking US innovation.

House hearings were introduced by subcommittee chairman Darrell Issa (R-California), explaining that US national security is at risk as China seeks to achieve technological superiority “Witnesses will educate us and, to some extent, scare many of us,” Issa told a colleague.

Issa told the subcommittee that China is the fastest growing foreign country of origin for obtaining U.S. patents, jumping from fourth place in 2018 to second place in 2022. Intellectual property rights for COVID-19 vaccine-related technology as “essentially a technology transfer to China and other countries.” While the issue can appear partisan, Issa said there are times when presidents on both sides want to appear lenient in protecting American ingenuity.

Issa also set the stage for another topic that was discussed at the hearing. It’s a trend to ban non-compete agreements that it said further threaten U.S. national security. “California, where I’m from, effectively makes non-competition illegal. As a result, anyone who gets a job in California has the technology they get, including trade secrets, free from California. You can move and simply go to another country and sell it,” says Issa.

Subcommittee ranking member Hank Johnson (D-GA) agreed with many of Issa’s views, but emphasized that these hearings aimed at China should not be misinterpreted as anti-Asian sentiment. Did. “We have seen an alarming increase in harassment of Asian Americans in our country,” said Issa. “I want to make it clear that the Chinese government is talking about a concerted effort to steal IP,” he added.

Jerold Nadler (D-NY), a ranking member of the Judiciary Commission, lamented China’s entry into the WTO 20 years ago, citing concerns about the impact of globalization on American workers and China’s democratic democracy. He said he voted against it because of skepticism about its commitment to liberalization. “Today, the Chinese government has become increasingly authoritarian, using vast arrays of technology to track its citizens and expose many, especially Uyghurs, to shocking human rights abuses,” Nadler said. cites China’s demands that US companies must cooperate with their Chinese counterparts in certain high-tech fields, saying it is “one of the many tools the People’s Republic of China has used to force technology transfers to its own country.” pointed out as

Witnesses at the hearing included the honorable William Evanina, founder and CEO of Evanina Group, LLC, who has worked with the FBI and CIA and is director of the Senate-approved National Counterintelligence and Security Center. was serving. Evanina told subcommittee members that U.S. national and economic security is in direct jeopardy by failing to take seriously the threat China poses to the theft of his IP. Mentioned losses due to theft of his IP from China only. It is between $400 billion and $600 billion annually, equivalent to about $4,000 to $6,000 per American family of four after taxes. “Our economic global hegemony, stability and long-term vitality are not only at risk, but are clearly at the crossroads of Xi Jinping and his communist regime,” Evanina said.

Rep. Scott Fitzgerald (R-Wisconsin) asked a question later in the hearing on how to keep corporations away from China in a capitalist society, when China is such an important market, and On whether legislation is needed, Evanina said: When it comes to China, companies need to rethink their thinking.

“It’s hard to say to corporate entities in a capitalist society, ‘Don’t invest in China for X’, but I told the subcommittee that the space in which we currently hold the hegemony of the world For the first time I propose to be in. Our capitalist mindset is clearly superseded and superimposed on our national security and interests, ”Evanina warned.

He continued: and national security. I think it’s a really difficult conversation, but we have to do it. “

But given the recent developments in Hong Kong and Taiwan, Chinese investors will soon start to feel the pain of not being able to withdraw money from their investments, Evanina added.

Several lawmakers have pressed Evanina over whether the Biden administration’s decision to end President Donald Trump’s “China Initiative” in 2022 is detrimental to America’s efforts to champion innovation. However, he assured them that the project would continue under a different name.

Mark Cohen, Distinguished Senior Fellow and Asia IP Project Director of the Berkeley Center for Law and Technology, also testified, telling the subcommittee that he found it interesting as “an observer of IP developments on both sides of the Pacific.”at the same time if innumerable and Car ski was decided by the Supreme Court, China amended its examination guidelines to allow the exact same subject matter, now ineligible for patent. [in the U.S.], will be granted in China. Cohen said the decision likely resulted “in part” from the U.S. Supreme Court ruling and China’s own success in areas such as fintech and medical diagnostics.

This development, combined with the widespread availability of injunctions in China, has contributed to China’s growth towards its goal of becoming the center of international intellectual property litigation, Cohen said. Cohen noted that China has promoted many of her more than 2,000 IP judges to higher government roles, but “the promotion of a Federal Circuit judge to the Not yet.”

Cohen then told subcommittee member Adam Schiff (D-CA) that the role of U.S. Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator (IPEC) had been vacant for far too long, and that filling the role was an intellectual property The many “alphabet soup” agencies across government involved in the protection and enforcement of

Jamieson Greer of King & Spalding and Charles Duan of American University Washington College of Law also testified at the hearing.

AI Masters Panelists Opinion on China

About 30 minutes north of the subcommittee hearings, at IPWatchdog headquarters in Ashburn, Virginia, at the final panel of the AI ​​Masters Program, at the panel on AI and the U.S. Economy and National Security, Former United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) Secretary Andrei Iancu said, like Cohen, a high-level person in charge of US government IP is needed to ensure a solid strategy against threats like China.

“I think American innovation needs cabinet-level positions,” Iancu said. “It can take many forms, but it is such an important component of our national economy and security that it is not enough to have a commission somewhere. We need to lift, and in doing so, we need a whole-of-government approach to strategizing on all these issues.”

China has a clear innovation strategy, but the US does not, says Rama Elluru of the Special Competition Research Project, who was also director of the National Security Council on Artificial Intelligence (NSCAI). The NSCAI, he said, will issue a report in 2021 warning that the U.S. is underinvesting in AI to compete with China and ill-prepared to defend against AI threats to national security. .

Elluru noted that China last month set up a National Data Authority to oversee how datasets are collected, shared and integrated, but the US still doesn’t even have a privacy framework, “let alone a strategy.” .

Iancu adds: Or at least someone should think about data protection strategies. “

Brad Watts of the Global Innovation Policy Center (GIPC), former Minority Principal Counsel on Senate Judiciary Committee Subcommittee on Intellectual Property for Senator Tom Tillis (R-North Carolina), will moderate the panel and asked Ianku and Eller about what values ​​the United States is no longer first. Elluru responded that the impact goes far beyond simply falling behind financially.

“At the heart of technology competition is also value competition. These competitions set the rules for how these emerging technologies affect our society,” said Elluru. “Will it be authoritarian or democratic?”

The next IPWatchdog Masters program, the ITC Masters, will be held April 11-12 at IPWatchdog headquarters. Register here.