The Senate Judiciary Committee appeared unlikely to mark...

The Senate Judiciary Committee appeared unlikely to mark up the Patent Transparency and Improvements Act (S-1720) Thursday, two stakeholders told us. “Thursday is going to be a stretch,” said Daniel Nazer, an Electronic Frontier Foundation staff attorney who’s focusing on Capitol Hill’s patent revamp efforts. The committee postponed the S-1720 markup Tuesday amid continued disagreements about controversial provisions in the bill, but Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., had said he hoped the committee would reach a deal in time to consider it Thursday (CD April 9 p13). Senate Judiciary had not rescheduled its executive business meeting, during which the committee would mark up the bill, at our deadline Wednesday. If the committee does not mark up S-1720 this week, it will have to wait until after the upcoming two-week recess. Members of the committee were still disagreeing over several longstanding issues in the bill, including the language in a proposed fee-shifting provision, an industry lawyer said.