Does the Japanese government have any plans to amend Japans patent law in 2009?
Our government and our Diet changes our patent law almost every year. This year our government is planning to produce a draft act. Frankly speaking our patent law should be changed and improved in some points. One of these is the system for rewarding employee inventions. The law changed around four years ago and many people in Japan remember the controversy around the issue. In this case it is important for our government to produce a better draft, but we don’t have any applied cases so far because nobody has sued their employee as yet, based on the previous amendment. Does Japan have an exact equivalent of the Bayh-Dole Act to encourage technology transfer? We have many Acts that are equivalent to those in the US, but the surrounding situation is very different. For example we don’t have the same kinds of bankers or venture capitalists as they do in the US and California. Also, our universities do not have to seek money in the same way as private US universities. Our national universi
