Patents 4 Partnership – USPTO’s COVID-19 Marketplace Forum

On May 4, 2020, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) unveiled a web-based Intellectual Property (IP) marketplace platform “Patents 4 Partnerships,” ( https://developer.uspto.gov/ipmarketplace/search/patents), a searchable database of patents and published patent applications relating to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic that are available for licensing.

The Patents 4 Partnership database is searchable by keyword, patent number, inventor name and other fields and provides licensing contact information or a link to an external website that provides licensing contact information.

The Patents for Partnership database includes patents and published patent applications that have been identified as available for licensing in the USPTO Official Gazette Notices¹ or on publicly available sources such as the Federal Laboratory Consortium for Technology Transfer (FLC Business), the AUTM Innovation Marketplace (AIM), universities, and a number of federal agencies, including the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Department of Energy (DOE), the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Department of Defense (DoD) and the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).

The initial launch is limited to patents and published patent applications related to the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of or protection from COVID-19, including disinfectants, test kits, ventilators, and components thereof. Patent owners may add additional patents and published patent applications for these and other relevant technologies to the platform by completing an “IP Marketplace Platform Submission Form” that is provided on the platform webpage. There is no fee to add a patent or published patent application to the platform.

If a patent or published patent application is incorrectly included in the platform as being available for licensing, a request may be submitted via email (IPMarketplace@uspto.gov) to remove or correct the entry.

The USPTO plans to test this pilot program during the next six months and will consider whether to make the program permanent and/or expand it to other areas of technology. The USPTO will also consider whether the platform should replace or supplement the Official Gazette Notice of Patents and Patent Applications Available for License or Sale.

Inquiries regarding the pilot program may be directed to Marina Lamm, Patent Attorney, Office of Policy and International Affairs, by telephone at 571-272-5905 or by email to IPMarketplace@uspto.gov.

Inquiries concerning the use of the Patents 4 Partnerships platform may be directed to Scott Beliveau, Branch Chief of Enterprise Advanced Analytics, Office of the Chief Information Officer, by telephone at 571-272-7343 or by email to IPMarketplace@uspto.gov.