PATENTS ACT.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 242, 6 July 1908, Page 8

PATENTS ACT.

■ ' . ——« ; , . TRANSFER OPINDUSTRY-GERMAN ALARM. • ; ASSOCIATION —COPYRIGHT.} , Berlin, July 3. Herr Bethmann Hollweg, German' Minister of the Interior,# in reply to a petition :v. from German-patentees frith referenco to the ■< British Patents Aotj stated'that' Sir Edward ■. Grey, British Foreign Secretary, had ■■ inti- , mated; that, the .manufacture";in Britain of every patent' is not unreservedly required under .the new Act. • , . . SOME OBJECTIONS TO THE A'CT. • In the midst of the jubilation in Britain ' pver 'the tendency, of the Patents Act to'bring industry across;.tho ■. Channel and the North . Sea, there are not wanting dissentient voices.. i; An engineering correspondent wrotes to "The ■ Times' concerning Section 27 (relating to revocation of patents worked outside tne United ' • Kingdom):—"The' , section does not contemplate, and apparently does • not consider, the ': . grant of licenses to meet, the supposed re- . quiroments, but under it a revocation may be granted because 'the patented article or process is manufactured or carried.on exclusively : • or mainly outside the United Kingdom.' There, .are many manufactures or processes which aro -7- and can be carried on ill some couhtrie. 1 ) out- ' side the United Mungdom becauso of local conditions which do not exist here. An Eng- , lish inventor may not be: able to obtain a ! license in the United Kingdom,, and yet tho kingdom may be benefited by the working of liis'invention by tile, foreigner who sends the products to .this country. A British patentee may hayo no patents abroad, but ho may be abie to reap the fruits of his invention ; by the tax lie levies on the foreign manufac- : turer, .who is ablo to manufacture abroad = .what, be made, here, although' useful ....- in this country. There arc, moreover, some ~ ■ inventions /which owing to local conditions and V habits of nianufacturo- can • bo. in part carried out in this country and can only bo completed by a part carried out abroad. In this case tho inventor can bo defrauded of • his rightful return for his labour unless it can be proved that tho part which is made . or carried out abroad is not tho main part 1 of tho thing necessary to carry out his invention.

"It is trne 'that in consequence of ' tho new Act commencements have been made by owners of some foreign manufacturing businesses, including some chemical manufactures, to start works in England to work under their Much is made of this fact and of tho publication of numerous advertisements by owners of patents olTering them for sale or inviting licensees. Thcso facts do not,' however, prove much. It is, not a new thing for foreigners to start manufacturing works in ' this country, oven in the district most mentioned .in connection with the new law. It is very desirable that such implanting of industries should take place, although the- history of such ventures ' shows that they do not always succeed. . With respect to some of the chemical. industries it is well known that excise and fiscal matters in England have stood in tho way of progress with Bomo processes which have' arisen out of English 1 inventions. It is also known that in chemical matters inventors • aro few and patents fewer.- It is. a branch of 'inventiveness which, at least, in detail is undoubtedly more prolific in Germany, for example, and mdre spontaneously tho subject of' the brain, activity and .patience'.-of some races than of others."