Industry committee  The various treaties cover different aspects of IP law and I think, in fairness, how they affect different countries is a difficult and somewhat sensitive issue. The material I talked about, PLT, is generally a very sensible and favourable thing for all countries. I can speak qui

Industry committee  The consequence of not proceeding, to be truthful, would not be profound. We could live without the Patent Law Treaty. We could live without these changes. I think some of the changes, though, will help in avoiding simple mistakes where people have lost rights. There have been in

Industry committee  You've hit a sensitive point. Of course, anything that simplifies the work that agents and lawyers do means we are focused more on the hard work, the substantial work, which is as it should be. These will simplify procedures and the use of government time. They will cut red tape.

Industry committee  It is difficult that so much is left to the regulations, but I expect that's the case with many statutes. I do have a great deal of confidence in the people we work with at the patent office and Industry Canada to set up a system where these kinds of uncertainties won't arise. It

Industry committee  The intellectual property protection system does not by itself create the economy and jobs. It's a tool that helps innovators protect the investment that they've made. It doesn't drive it but assists in it. What you're getting today is a series of—

Industry committee  It helps by not having rights defeated by formal errors or little slips. Things will be decided on the merits of the value of a technology. You'll go to court debating whether an invention is new and non-obvious, whether a patent is infringed, not whether rights have been lost be

Industry committee  Thank you. I'll tackle that. I think you have a good process for consulting on this. There's a prescribed procedure for doing it. We would just welcome the opportunity to get in early, work with the department, look at the regulations, and have a reasonable time to respond. Ther

Industry committee  Thank you, Mr. Côté. I do apologize that I can't respond to you in French; I'm embarrassed that I can't do that. In this instance, we are implementing the Patent Law Treaty and the Hague treaty, two international treaties. Ideally, everything would get its own day in the sun a

Industry committee  Good morning. Thank you. I'm not going to read my prepared remarks with the illusion that they're different from what you've already heard, because it's exactly the same talk that Amrita Singh provided, so I'll keep it brief. I'm David Schwartz. I'm a partner at Smart and Bigga