IPWatchdog Patent Masters™ 2026: Building the Next Patent System: A Blueprint for US Innovation

The US patent system faces fundamental structural challenges—overlapping tribunals, inconsistent legal standards, and doctrinal barriers that make it harder to obtain, defend, and enforce even high-quality patents. At the same time, AI, software-driven innovation, and advances in pharmaceutical and biotech are exposing just how poorly the current system aligns with modern realities of innovation and commercialization.

At IPWatchdog’s Patent Masters™ 2026 conference, Scott McKeown will join a distinguished panel of judges, practitioners, and in-house counsel to address the larger structural question: if the United States were undertaking a serious modernization of patent law today, what should be changed? The discussion will examine foundational legal and institutional reforms necessary to create a system that is fairer, faster, more predictable, and better suited to the 21st century innovation economy—including patent eligibility under Section 101, the availability of injunctions, the obviousness framework after KSR, and how to rationalize and streamline proceedings across district courts, the PTAB, and the ITC.