I am not a patent “troll”
Kristi Gornias, a local inventor and entrepreneur, is founder of the Kristi G Company.
When I filed my first patent with the United States Patent Office,I never would have suspected the government that had once promised to protect the integrity of my intellectual property would try to pass a bill weakening that protection. Couched as the Innovation Act and the PATENT Act, the proposed bills are an affront to the innovative and entrepreneurial spirit of America.
I started my company, the Kristi G Company — known for the Amazing E-Z Wipe System and the Go With Me Chair — while working to find solutions to challenges I faced as a mother of small children. I needed ways to manage my life with them better, especially when we went places.
After a few months of selling my products on my own, I had a meeting with a large retailer, which asked how I would produce enough chairs for 4,000 stores; and a baby website sold 320 chairs in eight minutes. I ran out of inventory. It was amazing to see the interest in my inventions. I decided to license my chair idea to a big company in order to meet demand.
Unfortunately, that licensing deal did not turn out as hoped. Thankfully, I was able to work with good lawyers to terminate the contract. Because of the strength of the United States Patent system, I was able to get back all of my rights, patents and trademarks. I needed to regain these rights to my idea so I could begin selling the product on my own again. It’s like starting all over from scratch, but I’ll be re-launching the chair as my own this year. This is where the heart of the American entrepreneurial spirit lies: in the ability to reach up, to branch out, knowing your intellectual property rights are protected.
Backers of proposed legislation in the Senate and House claim their bills address the problem of fraudulent patent lawsuits filed by predatory entities. They cite the number of patent litigation cases as a threat to American enterprise, but the crisis is exaggerated. They use such broad strokes in their terminology that they label legitimate non-practicing entities – inventors like myself who have ideas but are unable to produce the product themselves so they license their invention to others for production – as “trolls” filing patent lawsuits just to make a profit off settlements.
I am not a troll. I was fighting to get my rightful property back from someone who was not utilizing it to its fullest potential. Being a non-practicing entity in a legal battle doesn’t make me a “troll.” It makes me an American defending the rights afforded to me by the Constitution to protect my rightful property. That is the problem with overly broad legislation like this. It would target the good with the bad and impact legitimate business. Without the current strength of the American patent system, I may not have been able to regain the rights to my inventions.
The proposed legislation will compromise the ability of everyone, save large corporations, to defend their intellectual property. Forty nationally recognized economists and legal scholars have spoken to this fact in a letter addressed to Congress.
As a patent holder, the sweeping changes being proposed are concerning. I’m a legitimate business owner, an entrepreneur, and an innovator. I hope to continue on as such. To do so, I need to know that when I file for a patent that my intellectual property will be protected and that I won’t be prevented from defending it.
Evidence against the proposed legislation is undeniable. Expert testimony affirms the bill will be detrimental not only to independent inventors and Mompreneurs like myself, but also research facilities and universities. Larger innovation groups that lack the funding necessary to protect patents under the proposed legislation will face negative repercussions as well.
Now is a pivotal time in the debate.
