Read more at Patently Apple

It’s not surprising that we’ve experienced an explosion in artificial intelligence (AI) patent activity over the past several years. As recently as 2016, the United States Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO) issued less than 1,000 AI-related patents.

By 2019, that number rose to over 3,300, and we are on pace for more than 5,000 AI-related patent grants in 2020. USPTO launched its Artificial Intelligence Initiative in 2019, engaging the innovation community and experts to determine whether AI required any changes to the U.S. Patent system.

Read more at Inside Big Data

The moon is both seductively close to Earth and cosmically far away: Decades after the end of the space race, it remains extraordinarily expensive and difficult to actually get there. The journey just got a bit easier, however, thanks to a freshly published NASA invention. The agency's patent doesn't cover a new piece of equipment or lines of code, but a trajectory — a route designed to save a lunar-bound mission time, fuel, and money and boost its scientific value.

On June 30, the US Patent and Trademark Office granted and published NASA's patent for a series of orbital maneuvers, which Business Insider first learned about via a tweet by a lawyer named Jeff Steck. (read more at Business Insider)

Microsoft's patent is for a keyboard with a small prism under each key. This prism has enough sides to reflect four different beams of light onto the key above it.

To display a character, the keyboard shines light in the shape of the character onto a prism. The beam reflects off of the prism onto the underside of a key, which then displays the character.

However, because these key markings are just beams of light, they can be changed on the fly. This gives them an advantage over keyboards with printed or etched keys, which stay that way for life.

(Read more at Makeuseof.com)

A coalition of four technology companies - Apple Inc, Google LLC, Cisco Systems Inc, and Intel - have sued the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office over a rule change that allows the agency to decline to review patents that are also being litigated in federal court.

The four companies sued the PTO on Wednesday, alleging it violated administrative law by adopting a policy known as the “NHK-Fintiv rule,” which allows the agency to decline to review patents through proceedings known as inter partes review (IPR).

(Read more at Reuters)

The United States and China find themselves in fierce competition to see which country will dominate the AI landscape and control future implementations of this emerging technology.

(Read more at Forbes)