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SPECIAL SUMMARY REPORT

THE GREAT DEBATE

FIRST-TO-INVENT vs. FIRST-TO-FILE

and the

INTERNATIONAL HARMONIZATION TREATY


TABLE OF CONTENTS
Home
Important
Instructions
for: Duplication,
Distribution, Use of
Information
Introduction
I.
Credits
II.
Foreword
III.
WSJ Article
IV.
Synopsis-Europe
Legislation
V.
Synopsis-U.S.
Legislation
VI.
Key Questions
#1 / #2 / #3 / #4
#5 / #6 / #7 / #8
#9 / #10 / #11 / #12 #13 / #14 / #15
VII.
Arguments & Rebuttals
At-A-Glance
VIII.
Closing Comments &
Recommendations
IX.
Notes

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    • IV. KEY QUESTIONS: #3

    HAS THE U.S. "FIRST-TO-INVENT" SYSTEM ENCOURAGED AND PRODUCED ANY TECHNOLOGIES, INVENTIONS, OR PRODUCTS WHICH HAVE MADE SIGNIFICANT CONTRIBUTIONS TO HE U.S. ECONOMY OR SOCIETY?

    According to the Small Business Administration, the following 82 significant innovations have been developed by U.S. small businesses* (with less than 500 employees) in the Twentieth Century (in alphabetical order by product):

    1. Acoustic suspension speakers
    2. Air conditioning
    3. AirplaneArticulated tractor chassis
    4. Artificial skin
    5. Assembly line
    6. Audio tape recorder
    7. Automatic fabric cutting
    8. Automatic transfer equipment
    9. BakeliteBiomagnetic imaging
    10. Biosynthetic insulin
    11. Bovine pregnancy test
    12. Catalytic petroleum cracking
    13. Computerized blood pressure control
    14. Continuous casting
    15. Cotton picker
    16. Defibrillator
    17. DNA fingerprinting
    18. Double-knit fabric
    19. Dry chemical fire extinguisher
    20. Electrical wire nuts
    21. Electronic spreadsheet
    22. Fiber optic examination equipment
    23. Fluid flow meter
    24. FM radioFoam fire extinguisher
    25. Front-end loader
    26. Gas chromatograph
    27. Geodesic dome
    28. Gyrocompass
    29. Hand-held fluoroscope
    30. Heart valve
    31. Heat sensor
    32. Helicopter
    33. High resolution CAT scanner
    34. High resolution digital X-ray
    35. High resolution X-ray microscope
    36. Human growth hormone
    37. Hydraulic brake
    38. Ion implantation in metals
    39. Kidney stone laser
    40. Large computer
    41. Link trainer
    42. Nuclear magnetic resonance scanner
    43. Nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometer
    44. Optical scanner
    45. Oral contraceptives
    46. Outboard engine
    47. Overnight national delivery
    48. Pacemaker
    49. Personal computer
    50. Photo typesetting
    51. Polaroid camera
    52. Portable computer
    53. Power line communications
    54. Prestressed concrete
    55. Prefabricated housing
    56. Pressure sensitive cellophane tape
    57. Programmable computer
    58. Quick frozen food
    59. Reading machine
    60. Rotary oil drilling bit
    61. Safety razor
    62. Six-axis robot arm
    63. Soft contact lenses
    64. Solid fuel rocket engine
    65. Sonar fish monitoring
    66. Spark producer
    67. Spectrographic grid
    68. Strain gauge
    69. Strobe lights
    70. Supercomputer
    71. Two-armed mobile robot
    72. Vacuum tube
    73. Variable output transformer
    74. Vascular lesion laser
    75. Winchester disc drive
    76. Xerography
    77. X-ray telescope
    78. Zipper

    *By no means a complete list. [ Back to top ]