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Friday Mar 28, 2014

USPTO’s Office of Policy and International Affairs Continues Building Support for U.S. Innovators and Entrepreneurs

Guest blog by Chief Policy Officer and Director for International Affairs Shira Perlmutter

In the first quarter of fiscal year 2014, the Office of Policy and International Affairs (OPIA) conducted dozens of programs designed to provide intellectual property (IP) capacity-building and technical assistance to domestic and international audiences. These programs to boost IP awareness and understanding are managed through our Global Intellectual Property Academy (GIPA), and tracking them is one of the ways we measure our performance.

In the first quarter of FY14, we conducted three domestic programs that reached 360 participants. A particularly interesting program that I’d like to point out was designed to support veterans who have either started or want to start a business, and it was carried out in cooperation with the Small Business Administration and Syracuse University’s Institute for Veterans and Military Families. This program, the Entrepreneurship Bootcamp for Veterans with Disabilities (EBV), has a curriculum tailored to the unique challenges and opportunities associated with being a veteran business owner. Attorneys from the GIPA also participated in EBV’s third annual National Training and Alumni Conference on October 25-27 in Dallas. The attorneys guided veterans through an interactive exercise that highlighted the role IP plays in building businesses, and provided one-on-one advice throughout the conference.

Internationally, we conducted 35 programs in 41 countries that reached 1,211 foreign officials. A good example of our international outreach includes a colloquium on IP rights for approximately 30 judges, prosecutors, and investigators in Morocco. The colloquium was held November 19-22 and covered topics such as the investigation of IP crimes, the importance of cooperation with law enforcement, and adjudication of criminal IP cases.

For more information on our FY 2014 Q1 activities and OPIA’s performance metrics, I invite you to visit our Policy and International Affairs dashboard.

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