F.T.C. Turns a Lens on Abusers of the Patent System

By EDWARD WYATT, NYT

WASHINGTON — To its defenders, Intellectual Ventures is a revolutionary company unfairly viewed, in the words of its co-founder Peter N. Detkin, “as the poster child of everything that is wrong with the patent system.” To its critics, it is a protection racket otherwise known as a patent troll.

Now the Obama administration and regulators are paying attention.

This summer, the Federal Trade Commission is expected to begin a sweeping investigation of the patent system after the agency’s chairwoman, Edith Ramirez, urged a crackdown. She has singled out a particular kind of miscreant, one that engages in “a variety of aggressive litigation tactics,” including hiding behind shell companies when it sues.

Ms. Ramirez has not named names, but to many listeners, her description sounds a lot like Intellectual Ventures, the largest in a growing number of companies — more charitably called “patent assertion entities” — that buy large portfolios of technology patents and use them to sue software designers, smartphone makers and the like.

(More here.)