FTC suggests improving patent law policy

The Federal Trade Commission released a report on How to Promote Innovation: The Proper Balance of Competition and Patent Law and Policy. Among the ten FTC recommendations:

• Create a new administrative procedure that will make it easier for firms to challenge a patent’s validity at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO), without having to raise an expensive and time-consuming federal court challenge
• Allow courts to find patents invalid based on the preponderance of the evidence, without having to find that clear and convincing evidence compels that result
• Limit the award of treble damages for willful patent infringement.