This week, the Senate Judiciary Committee will consider the Promoting and Respecting Economically Vital American Innovation Leadership Act – also called the PREVAIL Act. I am deeply concerned that this bill will hobble a critical process that was established in the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act (AIA) to challenge patents that have been filed as a tactic to extend exclusivity of an existing patent. Before AIA became law it was a common business practice, often used by pharmaceutical companies, to file frivolous patents to de facto extend the life of a patent well beyond its term of exclusivity because the process to dismiss these patents was cumbersome and took far too long. This resulted in increased health care costs. As a result, Americans were paying higher prices for many medications than the rest of the world.
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