[Senate Hearing 117-531]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]






                                                        S. Hrg. 117-531
 
                    IMPROVING ACCESS AND INCLUSIVITY
                    IN THE PATENT SYSTEM: UNLEASHING
                       AMERICA'S ECONOMIC ENGINE

=======================================================================

                                HEARING

                               before the

                 SUBCOMMITTEE ON INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

                                 OF THE

                       COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY
                          UNITED STATES SENATE

                    ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS

                             FIRST SESSION

                               __________

                             APRIL 21, 2021

                               __________

                           Serial No. J-117-11

                               __________

         Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary
         
         
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                       COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY

                   RICHARD J. DURBIN, Illinois, Chair
PATRICK J. LEAHY, Vermont            CHARLES E. GRASSLEY, Iowa, Ranking 
DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California             Member
SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island     LINDSEY O. GRAHAM, South Carolina
AMY KLOBUCHAR, Minnesota             JOHN CORNYN, Texas
CHRISTOPHER A. COONS, Delaware       MICHAEL S. LEE, Utah
RICHARD BLUMENTHAL, Connecticut      TED CRUZ, Texas
MAZIE K. HIRONO, Hawaii              BEN SASSE, Nebraska
CORY A. BOOKER, New Jersey           JOSH HAWLEY, Missouri
ALEX PADILLA, California             TOM COTTON, Arkansas
JON OSSOFF, Georgia                  JOHN KENNEDY, Louisiana
                                     THOM TILLIS, North Carolina
                                     MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee
             Joseph Zogby, Chief Counsel and Staff Director
      Kolan L. Davis, Republican Chief Counsel and Staff Director

        .........................................................

                 SUBCOMMITTEE ON INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

                    PATRICK J. LEAHY, Vermont, Chair
CHRISTOPHER A. COONS, Delaware       THOM TILLIS, North Carolina, 
MAZIE K. HIRONO, Hawaii                  Ranking Member
ALEX PADILLA, California             JOHN CORNYN, Texas
                                     TOM COTTON, Arkansas
                                     MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee

             Rajiv Venkataramanan, Majority Staff Director
                  Brad Watts, Minority Staff Director
                            C O N T E N T S

                              ----------                              

                       APRIL 21, 2021, 10:00 A.M.

                    STATEMENTS OF COMMITTEE MEMBERS

                                                                   Page

Leahy, Hon. Patrick J., a U.S. Senator from the State of Vermont.     1
Tillis, Hon. Thom, a U.S. Senator from the State of North 
  Carolina.......................................................     2
Durbin, Hon. Richard J., a U.S. Senator from the State of 
  Illinois.......................................................     4
Hirono, Hon. Mazie, a U.S. Senator from the State of Hawaii......     5

                               WITNESSES

Witness List.....................................................    25
Edwards, Georgia Grace, co-founder, SheFly, Burlington, Vermont..     7
    prepared statement...........................................    26
Grayson, Angela J., founder and principal member, Precipice IP 
  PLLC, Bentonville, Arkansas....................................     9
    prepared statement...........................................    30
Mtima, Lateef, professor of law, Howard University School of Law, 
  Washington, DC.................................................    12
    prepared statement...........................................    54
Yen, Mallun, founder and partner, Operator Collective, Woodside, 
  California.....................................................    11
    prepared statement...........................................    50

                               QUESTIONS

Questions submitted to Georgia Grace Edwards by:.................
    Senator Tillis...............................................    61
Questions submitted to Angela J. Grayson by:
    Senator Leahy................................................    53
    Senator Tillis...............................................    62
Questions submitted to Lateef Mtima by:..........................
    Senator Leahy................................................    59
    Senator Tillis...............................................    63
Questions submitted to Mallun Yen by:............................
    Senator Leahy................................................    60
    Senator Tillis...............................................    64

                                ANSWERS

Responses of Angela J. Grayson to questions submitted by:
    Senator Leahy................................................    65
    Senator Tillis...............................................    67
Responses of Lateef Mtima to questions submitted by:
    Senator Leahy................................................    69
    Senator Tillis...............................................    69

                MISCELLANEOUS SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD

Appendix A of Engine's Response..................................    86
Appendix B to Engine's Response..................................   117
Engine Letter, April 20, 2021....................................   123
Intellectual Property Owners Association Letter, April 16, 2021..   135
Intellectual Property Owners Association Statement...............   130
Invent Together, Statement of Holly Fechner, April 21, 2021......    74
Ron D. Katznelson Letter, April 19, 2021.........................   133
Statement of Jeff Hardin and Patricia Duran, April 21, 2021......   125


                    IMPROVING ACCESS AND INCLUSIVITY



                    IN THE PATENT SYSTEM: UNLEASHING



                       AMERICA'S ECONOMIC ENGINE

                              ----------                              


                       WEDNESDAY, APRIL 21, 2021

                      United States Senate,
             Subcommittee on Intellectual Property,
                                Committee on the Judiciary,
                                                    Washington, DC.
    The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m., in 
Room 226, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Patrick J. 
Leahy, Chairman of the Subcommittee, presiding.
    Present: Senators Leahy [presiding], Hirono, Tillis, and 
Blackburn.
    Also present: Chair Durbin.

          OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. PATRICK J. LEAHY,

            A U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF VERMONT

    Chair Leahy. Good morning, everybody. I will say again as I 
have said many times, I will be glad when we can come back to 
having regular hearings where--our witness professor, we are 
not trying to put you almost in the empty room. It is the way 
we have to set it up.
    I think what we are talking about today though, is 
something that is amazing. The fact that our founders had the 
foresight to anticipate the power of innovation when they wrote 
the Constitution. They put the Intellectual Property Clause in 
the text of the Constitution. I think our founders set a young 
nation to become the most powerful and forceful economy on the 
face of the Earth. Just a few simple words created incredible 
incentives and led to the developments of life-changing 
inventions ranging from Kevlar to the microchip to 
pharmaceutical advances. More than 200 years since our 
Constitution was ratified, we still have not reaped all the 
benefits of having the greatest innovative economy in human 
history. That is because we have not done enough to tap into 
the diverse segments of our society that are brimming with 
brilliant ideas to change the world. I think America's economic 
engine still remains to be fully unleashed.
    The first patent issued in the United States, often 
attributed to Vermont, was issued to Samuel Hopkins in 1790, 
but then it would be 19 years before the first woman received a 
patent. It would be 31 years before the first African American 
received a patent. This demographic disparity in the patent 
system is one that continues to this day into the 21st-century. 
A recent U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, the PTO, found that 
only 22 percent of U.S. patients list a woman as an inventor, 
even though women make up more than 50 percent of our 
population. Other studies have found that African Americans 
apply for patents at about half the rate of white Americans. 
That means we are not reaching our full economic potential.
    A study by Michigan State University's Lisa Cook found that 
including more women and African Americans in the innovation 
that leads to patents could increase GDP per capita by as much 
as 4--almost 4.5 percent. There are other benefits to 
increasing participation among underrepresented groups. As 
Georgia Grace Edwards who will testify remotely today--she is 
from the Vermont based SheFly--can attest, if you bring 
different perspectives into the innovative ecosystem, you get 
unique ideas that other inventors may never have considered. 
The genius of the American people, the diverse genius, is one 
of our greatest resources. We have to improve access to the 
PTO.
    Ten years ago Congress enacted the Leahy-Smith America 
Invents Act. It was the first and most significant update to 
the patent laws in nearly 60 years. I am proud of the effort we 
took on that law to boost accessibility to the patent office, 
but we also knew, both Congressman Smith and I and the 
Republicans and Democrats who joined with us, knew that was a 
first step. We created a network of PTO satellite offices 
around the country bringing them closer to where Americans 
actually innovate. We lowered fees for small businesses. We 
created a new micro entity status to lower fees even further. 
We also created the Patent Pro Bono Program to help make legal 
resources more accessible to prospective inventors.
    We know we can improve the crux of demographic data to the 
PTO to give us more insight into the disparities that exist in 
the innovation ecosystem. That is why I was proud to cosponsor 
Senator Hirono's bipartisan IDEA Act which would allow the PTO 
to collect demographic data from patent applicants on a 
voluntary basis. Senator Hirono is a leading voice in the 
Senate for improving diversity in the patent system.
    We have to find ways to improve diversity in the patent 
system. It is the right thing to do, but it is also--
economically it is a great way to boost economic output in our 
country, and it has been a bipartisan issue and an important 
focus of this Subcommittee. I want to praise Senator Tillis for 
the work he has done. I have been in a number of the hearings 
he has held in this. He has worked very, very hard on this 
subject. I am proud of him. He is a good friend. I look forward 
to working with him and other members of the Subcommittee. I 
hope by praising Senator Tillis I have not brought about 
political downfall for him in his state, but I mean the praise 
and I yield to the ranking member, former chairman.

             OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. THOM TILLIS,

        A U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA

    Senator Tillis. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate you 
holding this hearing. It is a very important topic. I know it 
is important to you and to me and, most importantly, it is a 
key area of consideration for the American innovation economy. 
I also want to congratulate you on becoming the Chairman. I 
look forward to your leadership in this Subcommittee.
    I have to say you have to be one of the most prolific 
legislators in the area of intellectual property. I do not 
think it is an understatement to say that since the founding 
fathers laid the groundwork and the Constitution, you stand 
among only a handful of Senators that have invested so much 
time in it and I appreciate it. Looking forward to working with 
you and learning from you and I am excited about what we can 
accomplish together with a number of members on the team.
    Like the Chairman and many members on the Committee, I am 
committed to increasing diversity in our Nation's intellectual 
property system. For too long men--I am sorry--women, people of 
color, the LGBTQ community have simply been underrepresented in 
our innovative system. In this scenario is where I have some 
experience. About 24 years ago, after I was admitted to the 
partnership at Pricewaterhouse, I had my senior managing 
partner come to me and say, "I think that we need to focus on 
diversity." I think his idea of diversity was probably the 
African American community, but I asked him would he let me 
take some time to propose a framework and come back to him.
    In 1997, I proposed a diversity recruiting initiative that 
went after HBCUs, the African American community, 
underrepresented minorities, and the gay and lesbian community. 
In a few short years, the number of highly talented people we 
got from that diverse group was extraordinary, and they ranked 
among some of the best professional staff that I ever had the 
privilege to manage as a partner.
    Today we have got the same problem in our intellectual 
property system and they are underrepresented, and the American 
economy suffers as a result. They often face unique barriers 
engaging in intellectual property system, and their lack of 
access costs us billions of dollars a year. The evidence 
presented by the USPTO and others clearly demonstrates 
inequality in the patent system. It is past time that we take 
steps forward to ending inequality and redouble our efforts to 
improve the livelihoods and the well being of all Americans.
    I have been proud to work with Senators Hirono, Coons, you, 
Mr. Chairman, and Senator Durbin on efforts to increase 
diversity in the patent system. I was glad to see we recently 
reintroduced the Inventor Diversity for Economic Advancement 
IDEA Act this year. This bipartisan, bicameral legislation will 
allow us to better understand the background of individuals who 
apply for patents and gain a better understanding who apply for 
patents for the USPTO.
    I am hopeful we can move to a markup on this legislation 
and get it signed into law. I am interested in hearing from 
today's witnesses on other efforts we can take, no matter how 
big or small, to increase diversity and engagement in the 
intellectual property system. Thank you all for being here 
today. I look forward to your testimony.
    Mr. Chairman, if I could have just a moment of privilege, I 
would like to introduce a new member of my staff. We all know 
that the staff do the lion's share of the work and I want to 
introduce my newest team member. Her name is Susan Allen. She 
joins the team as a detailee from the USPTO where she was an 
attorney advisor for the Office of Policy and International 
Affairs. Susan has a wealth of experience in intellectual 
property law in both the public and private sector. She is one 
of the Federal Government's recognized experts in copyright 
law, and I am glad to have her on my staff. She is already 
doing great work, and I am excited to work with her. She 
actually wrote a portion of my opening statement, and it was 
brief, so I know she is going to work well in my staff. Maybe 
afterwards, Mr. Chairman, I can introduce you personally, but 
she is sitting here right behind me with Brad.
    I also want to say thanks to Senator Coons' staff. He was a 
joy to work with in the Intellectual Property Committee. The 
staff to staff relationship was great, and that is how we get 
things done. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Chair Leahy. Thank you, and I will be talking about a 
couple of our staff a little later on because one of the things 
I have learned in the number of years I have been here is that 
Senators are merely constitutional impediments to the staff. 
Thank God we have such good staff in both parties.
    We are privileged to have the Chairman of the Senate 
Judiciary Committee here and I will yield to him.

          OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. RICHARD J. DURBIN,

           A U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF ILLINOIS

    Chair Durbin. Thanks, Senator. Thank you for giving me an 
opportunity to be here today to salute you and Senator Tillis 
for your leadership in calling this hearing. Let me echo 
Senator Tillis and his praise for his new staff member and 
staff member's brevity. It goes back to a couple of things that 
I remember people have said. ``I am going to send you a long 
letter because I do not have time to send you a short one''. 
Then the exhortation which Muriel Humphrey made to Hubert 
Humphrey who said, "Your speech does not have to be eternal to 
be immortal." I think we all take that advice and try to live 
by it and thank the staff for helping us reach those goals.
    I spent a lot of my time studying intellectual property and 
entrepreneurship by watching Shark Tank and I hope some of you 
do too. I think it is an exciting and interesting program. I 
have met the fellow who runs it, Mark Cuban, several times. How 
often do they ask these prospective entrepreneurs, "Have you 
filed for a patent? What is the status of your patent 
application?" You come to realize that good ideas are stolen 
almost immediately and there has to be some protection. They 
recognize that in the Constitution. You recognize it here 
today.
    As you mentioned, Senator Tillis, we have your bill with 
Senator Hirono, the IDEA Act, which I hope to report out of 
this full committee quickly. I also want to commend Senator 
Kennedy. He and I teamed up to pass small claims resolution for 
copyright cases. I hope that we can see that implemented soon 
by the rules and regulations. You have an exciting panel of 
witnesses and I do not want to delay any further getting to 
them this morning, so thank you.
    Chair Leahy. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the fact 
you are going to bring up that piece of legislation soon before 
the Committee. I have a feeling we are going to get strong 
bipartisan support.
    We have--is Senator Hirono here?
    Senator Hirono. Yes.
    Chair Leahy. Oh, she is. I am sorry. Senator Hirono.
    Senator Hirono. I am here virtually.
    Chair Leahy. I looked around the room for you and I am 
sorry. I realized you are going to be virtual. We were praising 
you and your work.
    Senator Hirono. I heard.
    Chair Leahy. I yield to Senator Hirono.

            OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. MAZIE HIRONO,

            A U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF HAWAII

    Senator Hirono. Thank you so much. I join you and Ranking 
Member Tillis in welcoming our witnesses in today's hearing on 
the need to improve access and inclusivity in our patent 
system, a topic that gets too little attention, present company 
excepted. I really enjoyed Chairman Durbin's remarks, 
especially his reference to Shark Tank, because in one of the 
episodes a young girl from Hawaii got funded for her invention 
of a spoon to feed babies.
    We all know that women and minorities have made some of the 
most significant inventions in history. Can you imagine driving 
a car without windshield wipers? Invented by Mary Anderson in 
1903. What would we do without the home security system 
invented by Marie Van Brittan Brown in 1966? The genetic 
revolution would still be science fiction if not for the CRISPR 
gene editing tool discovered by Nobel Prize winner, Jennifer 
Doudna, raised on Hawaii Island.
    We should celebrate these diverse inventors and the many 
others who have contributed to innovation in this country, but 
we must also recognize the hard truth that women and minorities 
are greatly underrepresented in the U.S. Patent system. The 
Patent and Trademark Office's 2020 report on women inventors 
found that only 22 percent of U.S. patents list a woman as an 
inventor and that women make up only 13 percent of all 
inventors. For comparison, women held 48 percent of all full-
time jobs in 2019. Even if we focus on the STEM careers most 
likely to generate patents, we still see a gap. Women make up 
approximately 27 percent of the STEM work force in 2019, a 
number that greatly exceeds the 13 percent of inventors that 
are women.
    Racial patent gaps also exist. For example, a report by the 
Institute for Women's Policy Research found that the percentage 
of African American and Hispanic college graduates who hold 
patents is approximately half--half that of their white 
counterparts. Closing these gaps would turbocharge our economy. 
According to a study by the Michigan State University 
professor, Lisa Cook, including more women and Black Americans 
in the initial stage of innovation could increase GDP by as 
much as $640 billion. Another study by the National Bureau of 
Economic Research found that eliminating the patent gap for 
women with science and engineering degrees alone would increase 
GDP by over $500 billion.
    It is simply good policy and good business to make our 
innovation economy accessible to all. Thankfully, both Congress 
and the PTO have taken steps to start addressing these patent 
gaps. In 2018, Congress passed the Success Act, a bill I 
cosponsored, that directed the PTO to study the number of 
patents applied for and obtained by women, minorities, and 
veterans. The PTO's subsequent report contained a number of 
suggestions we can take to address the underrepresentation of 
these groups. The PTO also launched its National Council for 
Expanding American Innovation, an initiative tasked with 
guiding the PTO and developing a comprehensive national 
strategy to build a more diverse, inclusive innovation 
ecosystem. I look forward to hearing from our witnesses about 
the progress the National Council has made.
    Even with these efforts, there is much more we can and 
should do. I thank Chairman Leahy and Ranking Member Tillis in 
working with me to reintroduce the Inventor Diversity for 
Economic Advancement or IDEA Act. This bipartisan legislation 
comes from a recommendation in the Success Act report that I 
referenced and would direct the PTO to collect demographic data 
from patent applicants on a volunteer basis and issue regular 
reports on the data collected. This would give us greater 
incentive to what patents gaps exist and how to address them.
    The Judiciary Committee should vote on the IDEA Act next 
week. I hope the bill will pass this Committee with strong 
bipartisan support so we can consider and pass the bill in the 
Senate. Last year, Senators Tillis and Coons joined me in a 
letter to the PTO Director Iancu asking the PTO to look into 
the underrepresentation of women in the Patent Bar. We actually 
have a bar, specialty bar, for patent lawyers. I do not know if 
this was Ms. Edwards' experience, but sometimes it takes a 
woman patent attorney to appreciate certain inventions. I am 
glad the PTO is already taking action to ensure the Patent Bar 
membership is accessible to all qualified candidates. I look 
forward to seeing this work continue.
    We can also encourage more women and minorities to pursue 
STEM careers. Last Congress, I introduced two bills: the STEM 
Opportunities Act and the Women and Minorities in STEM Booster 
Act aimed at improving the recruitment, retention, and success 
of women and minorities at all stages of the STEM pipeline. I 
hope my colleagues will join me in cosponsoring these bills in 
this Congress. I do add that, you know, we talk about wanting 
more diversity and representation by women and minorities. All 
of this does not happen because we think it is a good idea. We 
can take actual steps, concrete steps, to make these happen.
    I have mentioned some of the few steps we can take to 
increase diversity in our patent system. Once again, I thank 
you, Mr. Chairman, and Ranking Member Tillis for calling this 
hearing. Mahalo.
    Chair Leahy. Thank you, Senator Hirono. I look forward to 
your legislation coming up soon, and I think this may be 
something that shows the Senate can be bipartisan with the work 
that you and Senator Tillis and others have done on that, and I 
look forward to seeing us vote on it on the floor, and I 
applaud you for that.
    We are going to have--our first witness is Georgia Grace 
Edwards. She is the co-founder of the Vermont based women's 
apparel company, SheFly. In addition to her work starting 
SheFly, Ms. Edwards is an economic consultant in Boston. She 
has worked as an Alaskan glacial guide. She was a Fulbright 
Fellow in the Czech Republic. She is a graduate of Middlebury 
College in Vermont. I think she has an interesting story to 
tell and she is going to be here virtually, I believe to 
testify from Arizona. Ms. Edwards, you are on.

              STATEMENT OF GEORGIA GRACE EDWARDS,

            CO-FOUNDER, SHEFLY, BURLINGTON, VERMONT

    Ms. Edwards. Good morning. I would like to start by 
thanking Senator Leahy and his staff for their work to improve 
access and inclusivity in the U.S. patenting process. This push 
for greater diversity and outreach efforts in American 
intellectual property is an initiative with the potential for 
tangible effects, not just on our small businesses in Vermont, 
but on individuals and businesses across our Nation. I am only 
25 years old, but I have a feeling that this opportunity to 
share my experience as an American entrepreneur and inventor 
will be among the greatest honors of my life, and I am very 
grateful to you all for having me here today.
    SheFly is a layerable line of outdoor pants for women that 
allow us to comfortably, safely, and easily answer nature's 
call, quite literally speaking, without exposing skin to the 
elements or other people. Our patented technology features a 
zipper and accompanying flap, which begin at the base of the 
zipper we are accustomed to using to get our pants on and off 
and extends all the way to the back of the pant, so that the 
user can control the size and location of the space they need 
to create. Through this design, we are able to help the one in 
three women who have had a bathroom accident in the past year 
while adventuring outside, a statistic that has presumably only 
increased during the COVID-19 pandemic as more Americans have 
taken to the outdoors and more public restrooms have closed.
    As a Vermont small business owner, my ability to protect my 
ideas as well as those of my co-founders, Bianca Gonzalez and 
Charlotte Massey, was crucial to our ability to scale and 
succeed. Patenting is extremely central to our business model. 
In our country's vibrant and highly competitive startup 
ecosystem, patents make or break an entrepreneur's ability to 
signal legitimacy in a market, gain new customers, establish 
additional revenue streams, and achieve a favorable valuation 
with investors.
    More importantly, our patents are what will allow us to 
bring our technology to people in all different sectors. Not 
only rock climbers, hikers, and mountaineers, but also field 
scientists, ski patrollers, farmers, bridge inspectors, 
international aid workers, park rangers, people who use 
wheelchairs, and women on the front lines of our military. 
Women risking their lives to protect American citizens have 
more important things to worry about than when and where they 
can next relieve themselves. They deserve the top technology 
our society has to offer, and patents increase the reach of 
good ideas and the number of people in our society who can 
benefit from them.
    Intellectual property rights do not come easily, especially 
for traditionally underrepresented groups. My hope is that by 
sharing SheFly's experience, we can work together to make the 
patenting path a bit smoother for those who will walk it next, 
especially for those who do not currently see themselves 
reflected in the process. In navigating that patenting and 
trademarking process, SheFly faced three specific interrelated 
barriers: the representation barrier; the knowledge barrier; 
and the financial barrier. These obstacles operate in a 
positive feedback loop, further entrenching detrimental cycles 
that prevent the U.S. from effectively taking advantage of the 
brilliant ideas that everyday Americans have to offer.
    For an entrepreneur, the initial steps in building a 
company involve talking to people, cold calling, putting out 
feelers, making connections with those who have been through it 
before and can advise on helpful contacts and tips. In the 
Middlebury Entrepreneurs class where I built out SheFly, I 
spent an entire month doing just that and was unable to find a 
single person with my background who had been through the IP 
process in my industry. In fact, I did not talk about patenting 
with anyone who was not a wealthy, white, middle-aged male in 
the field of engineering or tech. The power of representation 
is greatly underestimated. When you do not see people who look 
like you doing something you wish to do, it makes you question 
whether it is even possible in the first place.
    Patenting in the U.S. is an extremely intimidating, long, 
and clunky, opaque process. That is my kindly worded, highly 
edited description of the process. IP law is a very niche body 
of knowledge. It is hard to teach yourself. The lack of access 
to centralized resources with clear, digestible information on 
the patenting process that is specific enough to help gauge 
particular needs and likelihoods of obtaining IP necessitates 
hiring patent attorneys.
    If you think you have spent a lot on the coronavirus relief 
bill relative to your overall budget, you should see how much 
SheFly has spent on legal fees over the course of the past two 
and a half years. There have been points in time when we have 
spent well over 50 percent of our revenue on legal fees to 
cover the immense amount of labor and cost associated with 
filing. From a basic economic standpoint, the long term upfront 
investment in IP is one that is often directly at odds with the 
short term realities of startups and small businesses. Due to 
the high cost and low probability of reward through patent 
approval, entrepreneurs are not incentivized to pursue IP in 
our current economy.
    In closing, I would like to emphasize that any proposed 
legislation that fails to recognize and address the 
representation, knowledge, and financial barriers to innovators 
will be incomplete. I envision a world where one day women and 
girls do not have to think twice about answering nature's call, 
nor about their ability to participate in the U.S. economy as 
inventors, entrepreneurs, and small business owners. I and so 
many others are counting on you to change the traditional 
narrative of entrepreneurship in America. Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Ms. Edwards appears as 
submission for the record.]
    Chair Leahy. Thank you very much. I will put your full 
statement and your background in the record. It is worth 
reading. I would note that it has been read carefully by my 
wife, my daughter, and two of our granddaughters, and soon the 
third one will be reading it. Thank you very much.
    Our next witness is Angela Grayson, the founder and 
principal member of Precipice IP. It helps entrepreneurs and 
technology focused businesses protect their products and 
brands, designs, data. Prior to founding Precipice, Ms. Grayson 
was associate general counsel for intellectual property, patent 
operations lead at Wal-Mart stores. She also served as a patent 
examiner. She is currently chair of the American Intellectual 
Property Law Association Diversity in IP Law Committee.
    Ms. Grayson, you are also reaching us remotely. Go ahead, 
please.

            STATEMENT OF ANGELA J. GRAYSON, FOUNDER

            AND PRINCIPAL MEMBER, PRECIPICE IP PLLC,

        AMERICAN INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY LAW ASSOCIATION,

                     BENTONVILLE, ARKANSAS

    Ms. Grayson. Thank you. To the Chair, Senator Leahy, 
Ranking Member Senator Tillis, distinguished members of the 
Intellectual Property Subcommittee, I appreciate the 
opportunity to present the views of the American Intellectual 
Property Law Association on improving access and inclusivity in 
the patent system.
    My name is Angela Grayson. I am a technology lawyer. I am 
the rare woman of color who is also a registered patent 
attorney. I am here to represent the views of AIPLA where I 
presently serve as chair of the Diversity in IP Law Committee 
and the views I express today are not my clients.
    Founded in 1897, AIPLA is a national intellectual property 
bar association with approximately 8,500 members. We are 
engaged in private and corporate practice, government service, 
and academia. In recent years, objective indicators revealed 
the United States' standing in innovation is changing. Our 
nation's leading agencies, namely the Department of Commerce 
and the USPTO, have considered a national strategy to counter 
this change. To this end, the National Council for Expanding 
American Innovation was established with the strategic purpose 
to develop new ways to expand innovation. The Council's role is 
to tap into the strength of our Nation's diversity and find 
ways to increase opportunities for all Americans to participate 
in our innovation system.
    Data continues to show that diverse teams achieve better 
results. Yet, women and socially and economically disadvantaged 
individuals comprise a small fraction of innovators who apply 
for and obtain patents. The reality is that women and people of 
color are innovating, but many do not take the next step to 
patent because they face a variety of barriers. This lack of 
participation in our patent system is a problem for all of us 
because it is well accepted that innovation used effectively 
can grow economies. The more innovators opting into our patent 
system, the greater the capacity for our economy to grow.
    To support our diverse innovators opting into our patent 
system, we need to actively acknowledge the creativity and 
ingenuity of diverse populations. It is not enough to simply 
educate, but we must acknowledge and celebrate diversity 
because doing so we can catalyze and unleash the creativity and 
value of others.
    Next, we should empathize with the challenges faced by 
diverse populations. We believe it is important that everyone 
participating and contributing to innovation is recognized in 
value for their contribution. As an example, in-house 
professionals can employ empathy to identify women and people 
of color to uncover hidden and lost Einsteins, people who 
possibly should have been listed on invention disclosures, but 
were not. Understanding and empathizing with the challenges 
faced by innovative women and people of color can help in 
assessing and elevating innovation through these individuals to 
drive our Nation's economic engine.
    Last, we must activate resources, both human and material, 
in particular for those diverse populations which may be 
unaware or may lack the confidence to use. The USPTO, the legal 
community, states, and other players in the innovation 
ecosystem have amassed many, many resources for innovators. 
However, simply because a resource exists does not mean that 
the intended recipient will discover it.
    When the ``Lost Einsteins'' hearings took place before this 
Subcommittee in 2019, it was surprising to hear in some of the 
testimony that a number of women and inventors of color 
believed few resources, both legal and financial, existed that 
could assist them in their quest to protect their intellectual 
property. We believe substantial resources do exist to assist 
inventors. For example, Patent Pro Bono, the SBA, SBA-backed 
Entrepreneurial Support Organizations, SBIR, STTR programs, and 
the USPTO's phenomenal educational programming, to name a few.
    While these are not specifically targeted to women and 
people of color, early indicators suggest these initiatives are 
already positively impacting these communities. Many other 
public, private, government, state, and legal organizations do 
their part as well to help in sharing their time, talent, and 
resources to remove barriers in our innovation ecosystem. 
However, disconnect still remains particularly with respect to 
women, helping people of color, and socially economically 
disadvantaged groups learn what resources, both human and 
material, are available to assist them. Outreach, education, 
mentoring, and awareness are so vitally important here.
    AIPLA appreciates the substantial effort of this 
undertaking by the Subcommittee and the opportunity to 
participate in the development of a very important dialogue on 
how to improve access and inclusivity in our patent system. We 
will continue to be engaged and lead the way on this issue and 
we are willing to respond to any questions that you may have. 
We look forward to working with this Subcommittee on this 
important challenge as circumstances allow. Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Ms. Grayson appears as a 
submission for the record.]
    Chair Leahy. Thank you very much. Again, like all 
witnesses, a full statement or additional material will be put 
in the record.
    Mallun Yen is the founder of Operator Collective. That is a 
venture capital fund focusing on opening the venture ecosystem 
for tech leaders from diverse backgrounds. She has previously 
built three other companies, is a founding member of ChIPs. It 
is a nonprofit that advances and connects women in technology, 
law, and policy. She will also be joining us remotely. The 
floor is yours, Ms. Yen.

         STATEMENT OF MALLUN YEN, FOUNDER AND PARTNER,

           OPERATOR COLLECTIVE, WOODSIDE, CALIFORNIA

    Ms. Yen. Thank you, Chairman Leahy, Senator Tillis, and 
other members of the Committee.
    I have spent my career furthering innovation, starting with 
patents and now working with startups, so I am an unusual 
combination of IP attorney, operator, founder, and investor. 
Because there tends to be more data on women, for shorthand 
today, I refer to women as a proxy for women, people of color, 
and other underrepresented groups.
    As mentioned, for many years I was the VP for Worldwide 
Intellectual Property at Cisco. When I was promoted to that 
position in 2005, there were so few women chief patent counsels 
that it was front page news. That led all seven of us to start 
a nonprofit called ChIPs, which is now the world's largest 
organization for women in patent law with almost 4,000 members 
in 17 chapters around the world. My ChIPs cofounder, Michelle 
Lee, was the first and still only woman and the first and still 
only person of color to serve as a Senate-confirmed director of 
the PTO in its 219-year history. I then built a startup called 
RPX that helps companies reduce and insure against patent risk. 
I am also a member of the NCEAI.
    A few years ago I actually invented something. It is called 
the collective venture model, which serves as the basis of my 
current startup, a venture fund called Operator Collective. If 
you spend any time at all with startups, it is hard not to 
notice that the venture world revolves around VCs, or venture 
capitalists, and founders. Both are homogenous groups, which at 
the time were about 90 percent male, predominantly white, and 
40 percent of whom actually went to Harvard or Stanford.
    Having been a founder, an investor, and an operator, I saw 
a huge missing piece, which are operators. Operators are those 
who are often not the founders, but the ones brought in to 
build and scale the companies as they grow. They are typically 
not in the limelight, but the ones who are quietly working in 
the background. Here are these wildly experienced operators who 
have exactly the right skillsets to help businesses grow and 
thrive, but they are typically left out. Most people are not 
trying to exclude these operators. It is just that the system 
was not built for people who give 150 percent to their day job 
and use any time left over for their families.
    I knew that operators were the missing piece, but since the 
traditional model did not work for them, I created a new model 
that would, rebuilt it from the ground up to optimize for 
bringing in busy women operators. To do so, we added three 
things: education, accessibility, and representation. We knew 
women operators did not have ready access to the right 
information, so we created short, enjoyable programs. We knew 
that a big hurdle was the cost of entry, so we created a 
sliding scale for financial participation. Another obstacle was 
time, so we made it flexible by crowdsourcing deals and 
diligence and creating redundancies. We knew that women are 
often criticized for self-promoting, so we built a supportive 
community that does it for them.
    In short, instead of making women conform to a rigid, 
traditional construct, we changed the system to make it easier 
and more user friendly for women. Today our $51 million fund 
has over 130 operator investors who are 90 percent women, 40 
percent people of color, and over 70 percent of them had never 
invested in venture before.
    There are several parallels to the patent world. Securing a 
patent, as we heard, is complex, daunting, expensive. You have 
to learn a system that uses terms outside of everyday language. 
You need to dedicate time on top of your day job and your 
family obligations. You have to have the financial means to 
hire an attorney or an agent. The system was not built for 
adventurers like Ms. Edwards. If we want to capture the 
innovations that reflect the contributions of all of America, 
we need to evolve the system. And so that includes the same 
three things.
    First is education. Instead of first time inventors having 
to recreate the wheel just to know where to begin, we have to 
make it easier to access and understand. We also need outreach 
to underrepresented communities early and consistently. Second, 
we must make it more accessible in terms of access to 
resources. The Leahy-Smith American Invents Act added four 
satellite PTO offices, a good start, but more would be better. 
Another idea is to revisit the USPTO's Patent Pro Bono Program, 
potentially to amend it to have it apply to underrepresented 
groups with a traditionally low rate of patenting. Third is 
representation. Highlighting inventors from diverse backgrounds 
helps create a new normal. It is always easier to do something 
when you see someone like you doing it already. This includes 
having a USPTO director from an underrepresented background.
    Finally, there is one fundamental piece that underlies this 
all, and it is something that the tech industry has been doing 
for years. That is data. We cannot measure progress if we do 
not track our data and results. The PTO is not permitted to 
track even the most basic demographic information such as age 
or gender. Senator Hirono's IDEA Act goes a long way toward 
ensuring this fundamental piece. Thank you for your time.
    [The prepared statement of Ms. Yen appears as a submission 
for the record.]
    Chair Leahy. Thank you very much and I appreciate and you 
actually addressed a number of the areas I am going to have 
questions on later.
    We have Professor Lateef Mtima. He is a professor of law at 
Howard University School of Law. He is the founder and director 
of the Institute for Intellectual Property and Social Justice 
which advocates for the recognition of fulfillment of social 
justice obligations and the application of intellectual 
property law and policy. He graduated with honors from Amherst 
College, received his law degree from Harvard Law School. A 
note for my colleagues, before the hearing the professor and I 
were looking at pictures of Vermont foliage and we were talking 
about the traveling through New England, something he knows 
very, very well. Thank you for being here this morning, 
Professor, and please go ahead.

          STATEMENT OF LATEEF MTIMA, PROFESSOR OF LAW,

        HOWARD UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF LAW, WASHINGTON, DC

    Professor Mtima. Thank you, Chairman Leahy, Ranking Member 
Tillis, and members of the Intellectual Property Subcommittee 
for holding this important hearing on improving access and 
inclusivity in the patent system. My name is Lateef Mtima, and 
I am a professor of law at the Howard University School of Law 
and the Director of the Institute for Intellectual Property and 
Social Justice. I appreciate your invitation to testify today 
in connection with this subject that is critical to the 
national interest.
    In the spring of 1970 in New York City, I watched the Times 
Square newsreel for developments on the effort to rescue the 
crew of Apollo 13. As for all other Americans and indeed much 
of the world, the dilemma brought a new dimension to the time-
honored supplication to bring the boys home. While we did not 
know the specifics, it seemed obvious that NASA spared nothing 
in the effort. Every possible idea from every possible quarter 
was being explored. Then, as recent events remind us now, we 
understood that when America makes use of her greatest natural 
resource, her reservoir, the most diverse pool of human 
innovative and creative capability on the planet, there is no 
challenge we cannot meet, no achievement we cannot obtain.
    Unfortunately, such has not always been the case for our 
patent system or our IP ecosystem as a whole. Too much of 
America's intellectual potential from Marion, Virginia to 
Greencastle, Indiana to Compton, California is too often 
undeveloped and untapped. To paraphrase blues great Robert 
Cray, like food left out all night it is talent gone to waste. 
Systemic inequities relating to race, gender, socioeconomic 
class, and even geographic situs as well as structural 
imperfections in the IP system buttressed by a philosophical 
indifference toward the social justice obligations and 
opportunities of IP protection have at times stunted the social 
efficacy of our IP system.
    That is why today I would like to applaud this present 
initiative of the Judiciary Subcommittee to improve access and 
inclusivity in the patent system and thereby unleash America's 
economic engine, as I believe it implements a social justice 
perspective toward our intellectual property ecosystem, one 
which recognizes the benefits of universal access, inclusion, 
and entrepreneurial empowerment and self-uplift. In the spirit 
of which I would respectfully offer three supportive proposals, 
which are set forth in greater detail in my written testimony.
    First, the development of a national grassroots community 
IP education program through which government IP public 
outreach personnel can collaborate with private sector IP 
experts who have relationships with IP underserved communities 
to conduct basic IP awareness and information seminars in local 
venues of social, civic, and communal congregation.
    Second, the development of a pre-prosecution patentability 
assessment pilot initiative in the U.S. Patent Office through 
which low-income inventors can obtain minimal or even no-fee 
preliminary confirmations of patent viability so that these 
inventors and potential investors can identify promising 
applications which warrant the expense of patent prosecution 
while avoiding the expenditure of limited resources in 
connection with applications unlikely to prove successful.
    Finally, the commission of a study as to how intellectual 
property concepts might be appropriately introduced into K 
through 12 and undergraduate arts and sciences education which 
is typically devoid of any reference as to the relationship of 
intellectual property to these academic studies and pursuits.
    With that, I would like to close my statement with the 
observation that America can no longer afford fallow tracks of 
human potential. Systemic impediments to broad participation in 
IP enterprise sap the vitality of America's IP ecosystem and 
deprive our Nation of enrichments to our technological 
development, cultural advancement, and economic welfare. 
Contribution to the national storehouse of intellectual 
property achievement is both the privilege and the 
responsibility of every American and promoting the widest 
possible participation in this enterprise can only serve our 
national interest. Thank you and I look forward to answering 
any questions that you may have.
    [The prepared statement of Professor Mtima appears as a 
submission for the record.]
    Chair Leahy. Thank you very much, Professor, and of course 
your full statement will be placed in the record.
    Senator Tillis said earlier we have been working a lot on 
this. He has introduced staff which will be helping us. I want 
to note that I am joined here by Scott Wilson who is my senior 
IP policy advisor and no stranger to this Committee. The PTO 
has allowed us to have Molly Silfen as a counsel detailee. She 
knows the law far better than I do, and so that is going to be 
very helpful. Someday everybody will be able to see them 
without their--without their masks.
    Professor, I note that we used to have a member of this 
Committee who has her academic ties with Howard, but she got 
tired of the Committee and moved to a different job in 
government as Vice-President of the United States, so otherwise 
she would be here to hear your testimony.
    I want to ask--I want to ask Georgia Grace Edwards a 
question. She is hearing this. She mentioned in her testimony 
that securing a patent signals legitimacy in the market. Let me 
go into specifics on that if I might, Ms. Edwards. What are 
some examples of what that legitimacy brought to SheFly?
    Ms. Edwards. Thank you for your question. I think there are 
several examples of how a patent helps boost legitimacy for an 
entrepreneur. One is the ability to legitimize and add 
additional revenue streams through licensing down the line. 
Companies are more likely to want to collaborate if a patent is 
in place. There is also the fact that without a patent other 
brands would have been much more likely to copy us from the 
start and we would have been left defenseless. As a small 
business, it is assumed that we would lose out against larger, 
more established companies. Patents are a way to protect small 
businesses and startups as they enter the market.
    I also think that in terms of legitimacy, patents signal 
that you have an idea that is unique and useful and novel. That 
seal of approval boosts both customer and investor confidence 
in your product. That goes a long way in boosting inventor 
confidence as well. The entrepreneurship world is pretty 
nebulous and so having something concrete like a patent goes a 
long way in fostering future success.
    Chair Leahy. Would it be safe to say that that legitimacy, 
especially if you are a minority or underrepresented community, 
that is just one more thing that you really want to have in 
showing who you are?
    Ms. Edwards. Absolutely. Yes. In underrepresented groups, I 
think this is--these are groups where imposter syndrome runs 
rampant because there is a history of being excluded and being 
left out. When people from these groups finally do have a seat 
at the table, it is very easy to question it. I think a patent, 
again, goes a long way as this universal symbol of recognition 
that you have made it and you are on to something.
    Chair Leahy. I was impressed in reading your background 
that you had taken a class at Middlebury on entrepreneurship. 
If you had not done that, do you think you would have been 
starting a company and getting intellectual property rights in 
your invention?
    Ms. Edwards. Absolutely not. I grew up in the Appalachian 
Mountains of Western Maryland, never learned anything about 
patenting or the IP process. Without the space and time that I 
was able to take at Middlebury College through both midcore and 
the Middlebury entrepreneurs class, that is where I was really 
able to learn about the process and that this was a possibility 
for my idea. I do not think I would be here today without it.
    Chair Leahy. I think we have to make sure that others get 
that same message out. One of the things we did in the Leahy-
Smith America Invents Act was to create a Patent Pro Bono 
Program through the PTO to allow inventors with limited funding 
to get legal counsel for free. In your material voucher, it 
said that 50 percent of your revenue went toward legal fees 
which must have been a tremendous obstacle. Two questions. One, 
were you aware of the PTO pro bono program? If you had not had 
to spend all this money on legal fees, would you have been able 
to spend that money in your company?
    Ms. Edwards. No. I was not aware of the patent--PTO's 
Patent Pro Bono Program. I certainly wish I had been aware of 
that at the time. I think to your second question about what I 
would have spent the money on with our business, I think a 
better question is what wouldn't I have spent the money on. I 
think paying ourselves and our team fair salaries for the work 
that we put in, being able to produce larger production runs 
from the start with upfront capital would have been helpful in 
reaching more customers. I also think R&D could have used a lot 
of that money. Right now we are in a position where we can only 
really design one product at a time due to cashflow 
constraints. Having more capital that was not going toward 
legal fees would have been really helpful for that R&D process.
    Chair Leahy. We have got to get that word out more and I 
would ask both Professor Mtima and Ms. Yen. We have--under the 
Leahy-Smith bill we created four PTO satellite offices around 
the country. I believe Detroit, San Jose, Dallas, and Denver. 
Satellite offices have conducted nearly 300 different training 
events, 23,000 people being involved. Can we do more through 
PTO to reach and assist underrepresented communities?
    Professor, you are sitting right here. I am going to ask 
you first and then I am going to ask the same question of Ms. 
Yen.
    Professor Mtima. Yes. Thank you, Senator. I think the 
answer to the question is certainly yes. First of all, I think 
the very idea of the satellite offices was just an excellent 
innovation in of as itself. It conveys to inventors throughout 
our Nation that they are the priority, that they do not 
necessarily have to come to us in DC, but we recognize the 
importance of coming to them. It also conveys that we recognize 
that innovation is everywhere and it is not just simply in 
certain pockets of our Nation.
    What we could do more in that regard, is that for one 
thing, I think we could benefit from additional satellite 
offices in particular regions of the United States. For 
example, I think the southeast region of the United States 
would be one, a good place. Some of the cohorts that we intend 
to target through these additional initiatives are well 
represented in that region. There are many highly professional, 
well-educated African American communities in that part of the 
country and those are some of the demographics that we are very 
interested in targeting.
    The Northern New England region of the United States is 
another such area. I spent some time teaching at the University 
of Maine. One of the things that really impressed me in 
Portland was how the local economy was working so hard to adapt 
itself to various--to the loss of various diminishing 
industries. There was a great emphasis on really what--I am 
reminded of what Booker T. Washington suggested of the effort 
to just drop your buckets down right where you are, where the 
people are, and to tap into the innovative talent that was 
lying dormant in the area.
    I think that the additional work that could be done in 
terms of additional offices as well as what was mentioned 
earlier encouraging those offices as well as the office here in 
the PTO to do more outreach, to actually send people out into 
the target communities as opposed to waiting or expecting them 
to come in and to send them out in collaboration with IP 
experts who already have ties to those communities.
    Chair Leahy. Thank you. I want to hear an answer also from 
Ms. Yen. I will note that I have gone way over my time, but 
obviously Senator Tillis will have as much time as he wants 
too. Ms. Yen, what would you say to that about whether we need 
more satellite offices?
    Ms. Yen. Yes. Professor Mtima said it well. I do not have 
that much more to add except I agree, which is that grassroots 
and bringing--bringing the patent office to the individuals 
around the country goes a long way because grassroots helps. 
Also partnering with local organizations is a way of ensuring 
people feel like it is accessible and something that they can 
travel to because it is very challenging to navigate, as Ms. 
Edwards noted.
    I agree that the Southeast, the South, as well as the 
Midwest, potentially the Pacific Northwest, as well as the 
Northeast. What I would do is look at where the tech industry 
has gone. Of course, not all patenting is in the tech industry, 
but if you can look to see where the tech hubs are, areas like 
Atlanta, South Florida, Louisiana, et cetera. I think that will 
help inform what might be a successful satellite office.
    Chair Leahy. You also heard when Ms. Edwards said she was 
not aware of the pro bono program. That would have helped a 
lot. Do you think we should get the word out a lot more?
    Ms. Yen. Yes. Absolutely. The Patent Pro Bono Program is 
potentially a great program, but I also think beyond just 
getting the word out, it is also taking a look at the 
requirements to see because it is primarily directed, as Ms. 
Grayson said, at financial. Do we want to amend it to account 
for underrepresented groups who traditionally have a low rate 
of patenting?
    There are some requirements too that when you actually read 
it sound a bit daunting, but actually when I clicked through it 
and actually took the course yesterday, made it almost all the 
way through, it is actually not as daunting as it sounds like 
because, for instance, one of the requirements says there is a 
knowledge requirement. One of the knowledge requirements says, 
``Okay, you either have to prepare a provisional patent 
application''. Oh, my gosh. Hugely daunting. ``Or create--
complete the certification course,'' which also sounds very 
daunting. Like how do I have time to do that on top of 
everything else? When you actually click through the link it is 
actually just a free training course and yes, you have to 
answer questions, but it was not that much harder than like a 
traffic school DMV exam.
    Chair Leahy. Thank you. Senator Tillis, please go ahead, 
sir.
    Senator Tillis. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thanks to all the 
witnesses for their opening testimony.
    I would like to start with more of a baselining question. 
Do any of you--I have asked my staff to look into this, but do 
any of you have any insights into how the U.S. patent system 
stacks up against say European, UK, Canadian, other free market 
economy patent systems to know if there is a significant 
disparity with where we are? Do they all have work to do? Are 
there best practices that we can learn from them? Anyone have 
any access to that information?
    Ms. Grayson. Thank you for the question, Senator. I did not 
look at that data in a ton of detail before in preparation for 
this hearing, but my recollection is that when it comes to 
women patenting, the United States does trail behind a number 
of countries. I do think that we have work to do. There are 
countries that are further ahead with regard to this than we 
are.
    Senator Tillis. Thank you. I just think it may give us an 
opportunity to build on some best practices if there are clear 
linkage between systemic approaches and better outcomes. When 
we have 13 percent of women listed as inventors and 50 percent 
African Americans, Hispanics, we know we have a long way to go.
    Professor, I believe your organization expressed concern 
about the appearance of bias in the USPTO and if the USPTO were 
to collect demographics on patent filers as proposed under the 
IDEA Act. Could you give me--expand a little bit more on the 
apparent bias? I think you were talking about a nonprofit that 
would track this information that may be helpful. Can you 
expand on that?
    Professor Mtima. Yes. I think the appearance of bias can 
come about in two relevant ways. First of all, there are some 
communities that are just fearful of what government will do 
with the information. Some individuals believe that the fact 
that the patent office is not aware of my racial identity, not 
aware of my ethnicity, actually works in my favor. Although 
that may be completely groundless, the fact of the matter is 
that if that is a barrier to people providing us with the 
information, one way to get around that, if there is an 
independent nonprofit entity, the kind of entity that people in 
local communities usually open up to, that could be especially 
helpful.
    Along those same lines, this is something that is of 
concern not only to people of various racial and ethnic 
backgrounds, but it is also a regional concern as well. I 
recall one of President Reagan's most famous lines that in 
certain parts of the country the words "We are from the 
government and we are here to help" does not actually make 
people feel comfortable. There are some people who perceive 
government as just they are here and when the leave I am going 
to be worse off. Again, if the people coming and reaching out 
to them and asking them for information are people they are 
more comfortable with, people who have a certain amount of 
social credibility, that was really what we were trying to get 
at.
    Senator Tillis. Incidentally, I like the idea that we need 
a satellite office in the Southeast and in New England. It is 
purely coincidental that that happens to be areas that both I 
and the Chair live, but I do think you have to be out there. 
The one thing that I have found with recruiting, diversity 
recruiting, you have to show up. I think that that is something 
that we should take under consideration.
    What other datapoints do you think related to the 
innovation ecosystem would be helpful for researchers? What 
other information should we collect and maybe what other 
agencies and organizations should be engaged in that process?
    Professor Mtima. I think another datapoint is applications 
begun by individuals in the targeted groups, but not brought to 
fruition, meaning abandoned by them. Oftentimes what can happen 
is we presume the obvious that sometimes they just run out of 
money. I think there is also this discomfort and suspicion 
about the process. You have individuals who they have obtained 
their skills oftentimes outside of the accredited channels. A 
lot of people are self-taught or some people earned their 
degrees working at night while working full time. For them, 
when people in positions of authority seem to be questioning 
their credibility and their expertise, that is just part of the 
normal patent prosecution process, right. That is what we are 
supposed to do to narrow down the invention. It may appear to 
some of these individuals that this is just another artificial 
barrier that someone is placing in front of me. Getting some 
understanding as to how many people abandon the process on 
their end and why that happens and to the extent that maybe 
some of these issues are a factor.
    Senator Tillis. Thank you. I think that is a great point. 
Even the training that Ms. Yen talked about, to us it seems 
simple. You just click on it and see that it is a simple 
questionnaire, but anytime an individual is dealing with big 
government, it is a daunting task. You see that in a regulatory 
context.
    I will be submitting some other questions for you for the 
record about possible other data we should collect, 
specifically around trademarks, whether or not we should have 
the same application for trademarks and other questions. I 
think all the witnesses, and Ms. Edwards, I have been on the 
website. I am an outdoors person and I try to get my wife and 
my granddaughters outdoors. I am going to make sure they are 
aware of your product. It is very innovative. Thank you for 
joining. Thanks to all the witnesses. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Chair Leahy. Thank you. We are going to be joined now by 
Senator Hirono virtually. There you are. Aloha.
    Senator Hirono. This is for the panel. Women and minorities 
who have not traditionally engaged with the patenting process 
may be turned off by its complexity and expense and as Ms. 
Edwards says, it is clunky. As she said, that is putting it 
nicely. Some of the resources made available by the patent 
office have been mentioned by some of you. For example, the pro 
se assistance program, a pro bono program, and a law school 
clinic certification program. These are all efforts by the 
patent office to help entrepreneurs access the patent process.
    For all of you, do you consider these programs effective? 
Do people know about them? What are some very specific ways 
that we can make these programs better serve the public that 
they are intended to serve? For example, Ms. Yen talked about 
the pro bono program and maybe we should look at who they are 
really helping. Do any of you know? Are these effective? Any 
improvements?
    Ms. Grayson. Senator, I would love to take a stab at that. 
I think the programs, when people find them, are effective. The 
U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, you know, I am--my personal 
practice means that I am on a number of email data bases or 
email listservs from a number of agencies. I think that the 
U.S. Patent and Trademark Office really does a good job with 
the amount of information that they push out. The question 
really is, Is the information landing on the right people? 
Because there are tons of videos and the office actually does 
some sort of educational online programming just about every 
week.
    I think the challenge is finding the right audience. I 
really love the professor's idea about meeting kind of 
underrepresented people where they are. Some sort of an 
initiative that involves the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office 
working with people in those communities or the people in the 
private bar or entrepreneurial support organization in those 
areas I think could potentially go a long way to having that 
programming actually land on the right people.
    Senator Hirono. Uh-huh. I know for a fact that the PTO 
office has sent people from their office to places such as 
there was a program in Hawaii and there were a lot of people 
who showed up to ask questions and find out how they could 
access the patent process. Any of the rest of you have any 
other good ideas on how we can land these programs on the 
people that need them.
    Professor Mtima. Yes, Senator. I would--First off, I would 
echo what Ms. Grayson's comments that these are fantastic 
programs. I just looked at the Innovation Hub again the other 
day and I was just reminded as how just a wonderful teaching 
tool that this could be. I think that again the issue is going 
out into the communities. We have a program at the nonprofit I 
work with in which we actually go into local communities and we 
find these places in which people are naturally interested in 
going, community centers, sometimes just local eateries, 
nighttime spots. I have characterized the experience that we 
have put together as almost an indoor block party. It has a 
kind of festival feeling to it and we give people lots of hard 
core information. People ask lots of questions.
    I think the key is that, you know, nobody likes to go to 
the dentist. It does not make it even better if the dentist 
office to make a house call. What you have to do is in addition 
to not only bringing the information into the community, you 
have to structure it in such a way that people who already feel 
intimidated, who already are fearful that their questions are 
going to appear dumb and they are going to seem limited, you 
have to make it as welcoming and as oriented to them as 
possible.
    That is why I think that working together with IP 
professionals who already have ties to these communities like 
all of my fellow panelists, working in collaboration with the 
USPTO office would be an excellent way to move the information 
and reach the people that we would like to reach.
    Senator Hirono. That is an excellent idea. Are there other 
places that have incorporated your kind of outreach program, 
Professor?
    Professor Mtima. Honestly, I have to say no. I think that 
there are other entities and organizations that are very much 
interested in this type of work and achieving those types of 
results. The thing of it is, is that the usual methodology is 
to put together a team of individuals to speak. Oftentimes it 
is, of course, including a diverse assemblage, but it is 
usually either: (a) to ask people to come to them; or (b) when 
the team is exported into a community, the structure, the 
framework, the presentation, it is just--people feel as if you 
just lifted an office from downtown and then just transported 
it into the community.
    Senator Hirono. I think that is also a really good 
observation. This may be some of the kinds of things that you 
do, Ms. Yen, with your Operator Collective. Yes, I know that 
minorities and women have a much harder time accessing VC. By 
the way, it is really good to see you, Ms. Yen, and please give 
my greetings to Michelle Lee. You are cofounders of the ChIPs. 
I was honored to be placed in your ChIPs Hall of Fame back in 
2018 following people like Michelle and Ruth Bader Ginsberg, so 
thank you for all that you are doing.
    What is the Operator Collective doing to really address 
some of these access issues, particularly to financial support?
    Ms. Yen. Yes. Senator Hirono, thank you for your long time 
support of ChIPs and all that you have done for the 
intellectual property community as well as the Asian American 
community. Thank you for your leadership. It is good to see you 
as well.
    A lot of these things are what we did to try to make 
venture accessible to women operators. Same thing, right? We 
are quietly in the background building. People do not know who 
we are. We look up and we see white males, right. We do not see 
people who look like us, as Ms. Edwards said. It becomes very 
hard to do so. You have to shift the narrative. You have to 
change the system. Instead of making your--you know as the 
professor said, instead of saying, "Hey, we need to now conform 
to this rigid construct," let us bring it to terms that make it 
more comfortable.
    That is from like education. How do you make it so that if 
someone is busy, has 150 percent to their day job, how do you 
make it easy for them to digest? How do you make it fun? How do 
you make it enjoyable which is like--you know, I am 
generalizing here, but women are social. We like to be 
together, and we also do not like to sign up for things if we 
think we cannot carry through with them. We did things by 
saying, ``Hey, it is okay. You can do this because we have got 
redundancy.''
    Just along those lines, which is thinking about instead of 
making the inventors or the would-be inventors conform to the 
rigid system, let us think about ways to make them comfortable, 
whether it is in the coffee shops. We have had our limited 
partner investor meeting not in a hotel, but we actually had it 
at my house, which is unusual.
    Chair Leahy. Very good. Thank you.
    Senator Hirono. Thank you. I know I am running out of time, 
but Mr. Chairman, if I may, it is really important to diversify 
the patent bar because women and minority inventors need to see 
people who look like them who share their experiences, so that 
is something that I am pursuing with PTO.
    One last thing. I would like to ask unanimous consent to 
enter into the record a statement from Holly Fechner, who is 
the executive director of Invent Together, an initiative 
dedicated to understanding the gender, race, income, and other 
diversity gaps in invention and patenting supporting public 
policy and private efforts to close them. Mr. Chairman, I ask 
for unanimous consent to enter this material.
    Chair Leahy. Without objection it will be part of the 
record.
    [The information appears as a submission for the record.]
    Senator Hirono. Thank you.
    Chair Leahy. Again, as I said earlier, I applaud you for 
your work in bringing diversity in an area where--I know the 
professor agrees. I see him nodding his head. We should all be 
agreeing. I thank also Senator Tillis for his work in that.
    We have been joined by Senator Blackburn. Senator, I yield 
to you.
    Senator Blackburn. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I am 
absolutely so delighted that we are having this hearing today. 
I thank you for this and for bringing such a great panel of 
witnesses before us. I have to tell you how timely this is. I 
recently had in the past week conversations with two women that 
I have met or two individuals I have mentored, each minorities. 
One of them--and, Professor, you will appreciate this. As they 
were telling me about what they were working on, I said, ``Have 
you thought about getting a patent for this?'' Their immediate 
response to me was, ``Well, no, but how would I do that? Who 
would I go talk to?'' We had a conversation about resources 
that are available. But you are so spot on when you say they do 
not know where to find the resources, so thank you for getting 
that entered in on the record.
    Another, the other conversation had to do with how to find 
people that could have them navigate that process of having 
created something, but moving it through that development 
process and then moving it to commercialization. I had directed 
this individual to where they could probably find some of those 
resources, but there again, the challenge is not knowing how to 
navigate this system. Senator Tillis talked about looking at 
best practices from other countries.
    One of the concepts I have always had an interest in is 
when you look at the microfunding for individuals that are 
trying to start businesses and I think that is why I have 
enjoyed mentoring women as they would be beginning to go 
through this process.
    Ms. Edwards, I want to come to you first. Let us see if you 
can articulate and if you can answer this or if you want to 
submit it for the record after giving it thought. Just let me 
know. What are some of those specific difficulties that you 
have encountered or women that have come to you to ask for 
advice, that they are encountering? Then likewise, were you 
able to find a female mentor or a male mentor, someone that 
could help you navigate that process? If you will just briefly 
touch on that.
    Ms. Edwards. Sure. I am happy to submit further thoughts 
following. I think that the biggest issue was not knowing who 
exactly to approach. I am speaking for myself, but I think that 
I would be more than happy to appear before other people who 
are thinking about patents and talk about my experience and the 
rationale behind it and how I approached it. I wonder about the 
possibility of creating some kind of group of women and other 
people from underrepresented groups to speak to those specific 
issues that come up for minority inventors.
    To your second question, our legal counsel is all male and 
they have been very helpful, but no. I did not have a female 
mentor in the legal realm specifically.
    Senator Blackburn. Okay. That is something I am sure you--
there were nights when you were working on your product that 
you wish you had had that insight.
    Ms. Yen, I would love to come to you because many times as 
I am working with women, they will say, ``I do not have access 
to capital.'' They go to the local bank and the bank says, 
``Well, I am not sure I understand exactly what the market 
would be for this product.'' Speak specifically as to what VC 
firms or maybe angel investors, that type group could do to 
move forward information to women about and to women and 
minorities as to how they can access capital, what the proper 
process is for gaining that access to capital, whether it is 
through a VC or an angel investor or whether it is through a 
traditional banking relationship?
    Ms. Yen. Yes. Thank you for the question. It is something 
that the venture world actually has been working on vigorously 
probably for the past few years with actually some great 
success, which is directed reach out to female founders. Ms. 
Edwards, I do not know if you have seen this as well, right, 
which is there are--what we started with with the venture world 
was actually diversifying the representation for the people who 
had the money, which is VCs like me, people who have the funds. 
There is a trickledown effect because it is very, very hard 
when no one anywhere in the process looks like you and they 
cannot relate necessarily to what you are trying to pitch, how 
you are trying to pitch it. We all have our unconscious biases 
that we are always going to have.
    Since a lot of it is education and a lot of it is reach 
out, which is directed reach out to women, people of color, and 
those who really just need to see people like them who are in 
these positions. It is--we have done it with a lot of success 
in the venture world with, for instance, a nonprofit called All 
Rise, which was started by some friends of mine with great 
success. I think also partnering with nonprofits, partnering 
with private individuals in addition to having the USPTO as 
part of it would go a long way.
    Senator Blackburn. I appreciate that. You know, in 
Tennessee, we have a long history of female entrepreneurs. We 
have Barbara Askins who was a scientist and a chemist from 
Belfast. She came up with a way to enhance photo negatives by 
using radiology. NASA ended up using this and then the medical 
field picked it up to make better x rays. Of course, even today 
we have the most incredible creative community in Tennessee 
with songwriters, with entertainers, with those that are 
creating next generation automobile engines that are working 
with GM and Nissan and Volkswagen and continuing to open these 
doors for innovators so that they can dream those big dreams I 
think is paramount.
    I thank you all. Thanks for the hearing. Yield back.
    Chair Leahy. Thank you. I understand Senator Padilla is 
tied up at a hearing and will not be joining us. I did not know 
whether Senator Tillis had other comments you wanted to make.
    Senator Tillis. Maybe just a comment. As I think about 
this, we have done a lot of work. In our Senate Armed Services 
Committee hearing we talk about China and its emergence as an 
economic and military superpower and I have heard reports of 
the number of patents that they are filing today are just at an 
exponential pace. Beyond doing the right thing, which is making 
the patent system more inclusive, there is a compelling 
national security and economic security imperative to drive 
more innovation.
    We are not talking about just changing the mix on the 
current churn rate of patents. We are talking about greatly 
adding to it. Professor, I think you mentioned the contribution 
or one of the witnesses mentioned the contribution of the 
African American women in the Apollo mission, an extraordinary 
story that had its hurdles in the beginning. When they were 
included, they are one of the reasons why we had astronauts 
return safely home, including Senator Glenn.
    We need to look at this from the standpoint of doing the 
right thing, but we are doing the right thing not only for the 
moral reasons, but for the compelling economic and national 
security reasons and the benefits that we would derive from it. 
I, for one, appreciate the Chair having this hearing. I 
particularly appreciate the work that we do after the hearing 
to move forward on measures that make sense.
    Mr. Chairman, I would like to enter into the record an 
April 16, 2021 letter from the Intellectual Property Owners 
Association representing a broad range of intellectual property 
owners that express support for the Subcommittee's efforts to 
address the gender gap and the racial gap among patent 
practitioners. I also want to include a summary of the IPOs and 
the IPO Educational Foundation's joint efforts to increase 
diversity and innovation in the ecosphere without objection.
    Chair Leahy. Without objection.
    [The information appears as a submission for the record.]
    Chair Leahy. Ultimately, we will keep the record open for a 
week for further comments and so the post-statements of all the 
witnesses will be included. Thank you for mentioning my late 
friend, Senator Glenn. He and I were elected the same year and 
he talked about what then turned out in the movie, Hidden 
Figures, and the women who had those numbers. I will not go 
into it here. I will mention privately what he said to NASA 
when they said they could not wait for the--they did not have 
time for them to get all the figures. Senator Glenn pointed out 
who was going to be in that capsule and he sure as heck was 
going to wait because he wanted their figures. The movie itself 
is a stirring, wonderful movie.
    With that, we will stand in recess. Thank you.
    Senator Tillis. Thank you.
    [Whereupon, at 11:28 a.m., the Committee was adjourned.]
    [Additional material submitted for the record follows.]
    
    
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