[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 130 (Tuesday, October 17, 2000)]
[House]
[Pages H9947-H9949]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER COMMERCIALIZATION ACT
Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and
concur in the Senate amendment to the bill (H.R. 209) to improve the
ability of Federal agencies to license federally owned inventions.
The Clerk read as follows:
Senate amendment:
Page 21, after line 2, insert:
SEC. 11. TECHNOLOGY PARTNERSHIPS OMBUDSMAN.
(a) Appointment of Ombudsman.--The Secretary of Energy
shall direct the director of each national laboratory of the
Department of Energy, and may direct the director of each
facility under the jurisdiction of the Department of Energy,
to appoint a technology partnership ombudsman to hear and
help resolve complaints from outside organizations regarding
the policies and actions of each such laboratory or facility
with respect to technology partnerships (including
cooperative research and development agreements), patents,
and technology licensing.
(b) Qualifications.--An ombudsman appointed under
subsection (a) shall be a senior official of the national
laboratory or facility who is not involved in day-to-day
technology partnerships, patents, or technology licensing,
or, if appointed from outside the laboratory or facility,
function as such a senior official.
(c) Duties.--Each ombudsman appointed under subsection (a)
shall--
(1) serve as the focal point for assisting the public and
industry in resolving complaints and disputes with the
national laboratory or facility regarding technology
partnerships, patents, and technology licensing;
(2) promote the use of collaborative alternative dispute
resolution techniques such as mediation to facilitate the
speedy and low-cost resolution of complaints and disputes,
when appropriate; and
(3) report quarterly on the number and nature of complaints
and disputes raised, along with the ombudsman's assessment of
their resolution, consistent with the protection of
confidential and sensitive information, to--
(A) the Secretary;
(B) the Administrator for Nuclear Security;
(C) the Director of the Office of Dispute Resolution of the
Department of Energy; and
(D) the employees of the Department responsible for the
administration of the contract for the operation of each
national laboratory or facility that is a subject of the
report, for consideration in the administration and review of
that contract.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from
Wisconsin (Mr. Sensenbrenner) and the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr.
Gordon) each will control 20 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr.
Sensenbrenner).
General Leave
Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all
Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend
their remarks on H.R. 209.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Wisconsin?
There was no objection.
Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
Madam Speaker, H.R. 209 continues the Committee on Science's long and
rich history of advancing technology transfer to help boost United
States international competitiveness.
Through the enactment of the Stevenson-Wydler Technology Innovation
Act of 1980, the Federal Technology Transfer Act of 1988, and the
National Technology Transfer and Advancement Act of 1995, Congress, by
the direction of the Committee on Science, has created the framework to
promote the government-to-industry transfer of technology that has
enhanced our Nation's ability to compete in the global marketplace.
H.R. 209, which originally passed the House in May of last year,
continues this tradition.
Last week, the Senate agreed to H.R. 209 and added a new section to
the bill that directs the director of each Department of Energy
laboratory to appoint an ombudsman to hear and help
[[Page H9948]]
resolve industry partner concerns regarding laboratory policies or
actions.
The ombudsman's primary duty is to facilitate the speedy and low-cost
resolution of complaints and disputes with industry partners.
In its consideration, the Senate made clear that, to ensure fairness
and objectivity, the ombudsman should promote the use of collaborative
alternative dispute resolution techniques, such as mediation, but that
the amendment should not be interpreted to empower the ombudsman to act
as a mediator or arbitrator in the process.
After its passage today, H.R. 209 will be sent to the President for
his signature into law.
I congratulate the Chair of the Subcommittee on Technology of the
Committee on Science, the gentlewoman from Maryland (Mrs. Morella), for
introducing this bill and for her tireless efforts to work
cooperatively with the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Gordon) and other
Members of the minority, the administration, and the other body in
crafting this important bill.
I urge adoption of the Technology Transfer Commercialization Act, and
I look forward to its signature by the President.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. GORDON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 209, the Technology Transfer
Commercialization Act of 1999, and urge its passage.
This is a bill but important piece of legislation that will make it
much easier to transfer Federal technology to the businesses that can
extract economic value from that technology.
It has been about a year and a half since this legislation was last
on the floor of the House of Representatives. It was a good bill in
March of 1999, and it is a good bill now.
The only changes which the Senate made to the legislation was to add
a section that creates mediators or ombudsmen at each of the
Department's national laboratories and makes sure that the appropriate
people in the Department's headquarters are kept informed quarterly of
the mediators' progress in resolving disputes.
This provision is a good idea because some small businesses have been
caught up for years in attempting to resolve intellectual property
disputes with DOE laboratories. Having mediators in each lab should
help small businesses by resolving those disputes much more quickly and
inexpensively.
The Senate did not change a word in the provisions we sent to them
last year. The bill still makes important changes in the law regarding
federally owned patents. It will now be easier for small businesses to
license these inventions and more likely that taxpayers will get their
money's worth from them.
I urge my colleagues to think about these businesses, many of which
are small and with limited resources, who are risking much to
commercialize Federal inventions. This bill will make their lives
easier, and it is worthy of our vote.
I want to extend my thanks and compliments to my colleagues who
worked on this legislation, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr.
Sensenbrenner), the gentlewoman from Maryland (Mrs. Morella), and the
gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Barcia). I urge all Members to support
this passage.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as she may consume
to the gentlewoman from Maryland (Mrs. Morella).
Mrs. MORELLA. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me the
time, and I thank him for his outstanding leadership as Chair of the
Committee on Science. I am pleased to be here.
Each day in our Nation's over 700 government laboratories, Mr.
Speaker, new innovations are created by our hard-working Federal
scientists to meet the mission of that laboratory.
There are instances, however, when these government-owned innovations
have commercial applications beyond just the Federal mission and have
been brought into the marketplace, resulting in consumer products that
have improved our quality of life while also enhancing our
international competitiveness.
Successful technology transfer commercialization from our government
laboratories is fighting our deadliest diseases, creating safer and
more fuel-efficient methods of transportation, protecting the food that
we eat, assisting the disabled, and making our environment cleaner.
I will just list a few of the current examples of technology transfer
success stories:
An infrared heat-seeking digital sensor, developed with Department of
Defense funding, designed to search for distant galaxies and spot
missile launches as part of the Star Wars program that is being used to
probe for the first signs of cancer in the human body;
A NASA satellite device used to locate hotspots during fires and
monitor volcanoes that has applications in recognizing tumors and
abnormalities in women's breasts;
Department of Energy research that developed gas-paneled, energy-
efficient superwindows has been transformed to develop an inexpensive,
advanced insulating material for use as a thermal packaging to ship
perishable cargo such as seafood, meat, fruit, prepared foods and
pharmaceuticals; and
Eye-tracking technology; food irradiation research that has an
application in the commercial sector.
But it should be clear by now that the importance of technology
transfer to our economy and our society cannot be underscored enough;
certainly, if we include some of the more storied success stories, such
as the Internet, the AIDS home testing kit, and Global Positioning
System.
So by permitting effective collaboration between our Federal
laboratories and private industry, new technologies are being rapidly
commercialized.
Federal technology transfer stimulates the American economy, enhances
the competitive position of United States industry internationally, and
promotes the development and use of new technologies developed under
taxpayer-funded research so those innovations are incorporated quickly,
effectively, and efficiently into practice to the benefit of the
American public.
One of the most successful legislative frameworks for advancing this
has been the Bayh-Dole Act. The Bayh-Dole Act, which was enacted in
1980, permits universities, not-for-profit organizations, and small
businesses to obtain title to scientific inventions developed with
Federal Government support. It also allows Federal agencies to license
government-owned patented scientific inventions even nonexclusively,
partially exclusively, or exclusively, depending upon which license is
determined, to be the most effective means for achieving
commercialization.
Prior to the enactment of the Bayh-Dole Act, many discoveries
resulting from federally funded scientific research were not
commercialized to help the American public. Since the Federal
Government lacked the resources to market new inventions and private
industry was reluctant to make high-risk investments without the
protection of patent rights, many valuable innovations were left unused
on the shelf of Federal laboratories.
With its success licensing Federal inventions, the Bayh-Dole Act is
widely used as an effective framework for Federal technology transfer.
So the process for licensing of government-owned patents should
continue to be refined, we believe, by refining the procedures and by
removing the uncertainties associated with the licensing process.
So if we can by reducing that and the uncertainty created by existing
procedural barriers and by lowering the transactional costs associated
with licensing Federal technologies from the government, we could
greatly increase participation by the private sector in its technology
transfer programs. This approach would expedite the commercialization
of government-owned inventions and through royalties could reduce the
cost to the American taxpayer for the production of new technology-
based products created in our labs.
That is the intention of this bill before us. The goal of H.R. 209 is
to remove the procedural obstacles and, to the greatest extent possible
within the public interest, the uncertainty involved in the licensing
of Federal-patented inventions created in a government-owned,
government-operated laboratory by applying the successful Bayh-Dole Act
provision to a GOGO.
[[Page H9949]]
Under the bill, its agencies would be provided with two important new
tools for effectively commercializing on-the-shelf, federally owned
technologies, either licensing them as stand-alone inventions under the
bill's revised authorities of section 209 of the Bayh-Dole Act, or by
including them as part of a larger package under the Cooperative
Research and Development Agreement.
In doing so, this will make both mechanisms much more attractive to
U.S. companies that are striving to form partnerships with Federal
laboratories.
Let me just close by noting that the bill before us represents a
bipartisan and bicameral consensus. I am pleased to have worked very
closely with Members of the minority, the administration, and the
Senate in helping to perfect the bill since it was originally
introduced.
I am especially pleased that the administration has issued a
Statement of Administration Policy which states that the administration
supports passage of H.R. 209, which will significantly facilitate the
licensing of government-owned inventions by Federal agencies.
I want to thank the chairman of the full committee, the Committee on
Science, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Sensenbrenner), for his
leadership; the ranking member of the Committee on Science, the
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hall), as well as the ranking member of the
Subcommittee on Technology of the Committee on Science, the gentleman
from Michigan (Mr. Barcia).
I certainly want to commend the ranking member on the committee. I
also want to commend some members of the other body, Senators
Rockefeller, Frist, Hatch, and Leahy for their input and for their
support in helping to refine the legislation.
I look forward to the President's signature of this important bill
into law.
I want to point out that staff also helped enormously. Barry
Berringer, Jim Turner, Jeff Grove, and Ben Wu especially worked very
hard on this.
The Federal laboratories are eager to receive the new authorities
contained in this bill, and I urge all of my colleagues to support H.R.
209.
{time} 1245
Mr. GORDON. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Gibbons). The question is on the motion
offered by the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Sensenbrenner) that the
House suspend the rules and concur in the Senate amendment to the bill,
H.R. 209.
The question was taken; and (two-thirds having voted in favor
thereof) the rules were suspended and the Senate amendment was
concurred in.
A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.
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