Silicon Valley has landed one of the coveted satellite sites of the U.S. Patent and Trade Office, beating out Los Angeles and San Diego among other hopeful regions.
The Orange County Business Council had thrown its support and lobbying efforts behind the San Jose bid, with the hopes a patent office in California would stimulate the state economy while easing travel time and costs for West Coast applicants.
OCBC is the largest business coalition here, representing 300 companies, government agencies and nonprofits.
The other satellite offices will be located in Dallas and Denver, the federal agency announced Monday.
The first site is scheduled to open this month in Detroit, situated amid U.S. automakers and other manufacturers.
Competition was stiff, as the original list of 600 applicants was pared down to about 50 markets, and then trimmed to about 10 finalists, according to informed sources.
Orange County was not among the applicants, a somewhat surprising revelation considering its legacy of businesses innovation, international trade and patent creation.
Top distinction in that latter category goes to Silicon Valley, which received 4.1% of the 244,341 U.S. patents granted in 2010, and about a third of those granted in California, according to the most recent available data.
That’s almost as big a share as New York, Chicago and Austin, Texas, combined. All three of those markets also were in contention.
The America Invents Act, passed last September, featured a provision to add at least three satellite offices to the main patent office in Alexandria, Va.
