# Former Trump and Biden Officials Warn Weak Patent Law Is a National Security Risk

> Former USPTO director Andrei Iancu and former National Cyber Director Chris Inglis argue that eroded patent protections are starving the startups America's defense technology edge increasingly depends on.

- Source: Foreign Time
- Canonical URL: https://foreigntime.com/article/patent-policy-startups-national-security-iancu-inglis
- Author: Foreign Time Newsroom
- Section: Security
- Published: 2026-10-20T14:31:58.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-20T14:31:58.000Z
- Tags: patent policy, national security, startups, China, technology competition

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A rare bipartisan pairing is making the case that weak patent protection has become a national security problem. Andrei Iancu, who led the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office under President Trump, and Chris Inglis, who served as the first National Cyber Director under President Biden, argue in a joint Fortune piece that America's defense edge increasingly rests on privately funded startups, and that eroded intellectual property rights are making it harder for those companies to raise the investment they need to survive and scale.

Iancu and Inglis trace the erosion to a handful of specific legal and institutional shifts. A series of Supreme Court rulings in the 2010s made certain software algorithms ineligible for patent protection, creating lasting confusion over what counts as patentable and discouraging research investment in exactly the kind of software-driven innovation the Pentagon now depends on. A separate Supreme Court decision made it significantly harder for companies to win injunctions halting patent infringement, leaving smaller firms more exposed to having their technology copied with limited recourse. The authors also point to the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, a body Congress created to review patent validity, arguing its current rules let large, well-resourced companies file repeated, duplicative challenges that can bury startups in legal costs regardless of whether their patents are ultimately upheld.

## China's lead in 66 of 74 critical technologies

The stakes, as the authors frame them, go beyond any individual company's balance sheet. They cite tracking that puts China ahead of the United States in 66 of 74 technology areas considered strategically vital, including machine learning and advanced computing. Beijing, they note, has spent recent years building out specialized intellectual-property courts and strengthening enforcement as part of broader strategic plans running through 2025 and 2035, giving Chinese firms a more predictable legal environment to commercialize innovation in exactly the fields where the U.S. is supposed to hold an edge. Iancu and Inglis also point to weak federal coordination on international technical standards, arguing that gap has let rivals help write the rules that will govern next-generation technologies.

## A bipartisan fix on the table

The piece backs a specific legislative package to reverse the trend: the RESTORE Patent Rights Act, the PREVAIL Act, and the Patent Eligibility Restoration Act, which together would restore easier access to injunctions, curb repetitive challenges at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, and clarify patent eligibility rules for emerging technologies like AI and quantum computing. Iancu and Inglis also call for more federal resources devoted to shaping international technology standards, so that American firms, rather than foreign competitors, have a stronger hand in setting the technical rules the rest of the world ends up following. Coming from officials who served presidents of opposing parties, the argument is pitched less as a partisan complaint than as a warning that patent policy, an often-overlooked corner of economic law, has become inseparable from how the U.S. keeps its edge in defense technology.

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Originally published by Foreign Time. Free to cite with attribution and a link to https://foreigntime.com/article/patent-policy-startups-national-security-iancu-inglis.