Source: United States Department of Justice 2
The Department of Justice announced today that it is requesting public comment on a new draft policy statement concerning standards-essential patents (SEPs) that seeks to promote good-faith licensing negotiations and addresses the scope of remedies available to patent owners that have agreed to license their essential technologies on reasonable and non-discriminatory or fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory (F/RAND) terms. The Justice Department worked with U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in responding to President Biden’s recent Executive Order on Promoting Competition in the American Economy, which encouraged the agencies to review the 2019 Policy Statement on Remedies for Standards-Essential Patents Subject to Voluntary F/RAND Commitments to ensure that it adequately promoted competition. Together the agencies, after consulting with the Federal Trade Commission, are now issuing a revised draft statement for public comment.