September 2019 marks an important moment for ParagraphFour.com with the re-launch of its new website. The revision to the site is a bit bittersweet. It’s joyous and exciting to refresh the look, feel and navigation of the site as well as take advantage of the enhanced features a new database can bring. But it is with a tinge of sadness to see the old site leave us.

I started ParagraphFour.com in 2003 when I thought that researching, cataloging, and analyzing Paragraph IV patent cases could be a really useful thing to many people. For those of you who may not be aware, many courthouse’s were not yet “on the web” back in 2003. This meant driving from courthouse to courthouse from New York to D.C. to pull cases from the clerk’s offices, copy them, and scan them for uploading onto the site.

Moreover, while the advice was easy to give — “just put up a website”– it was not so easy back in 2003, especially one with a useable database. Fortunately, I assembled the right people to help shape the vision and develop the ParagraphFour.com site, and we launched in January 2004. We landed on a great hosting company that has served us well to this day.

The market responded. In spite of some bad advice a PIV lawyer gave me while I was developing ParagraphFour.com — “this will never work” — the uptake for the data and research was truly remarkable. I can only thank my subscribers for helping make this vision a reality and know that the research has been solid and helpful to them over the years. Many of my subscribers have been with us for more than ten years.

But it was just time to refresh the site, and I reassembled the team to put it together. Of course, technology has grown over the past 15+ years, and pulling together a site that works for us was a bit easier than it had been, but it’s never really easy. Don’t be fooled by those who still advise — “just put up a website.”

The PIV Blog
One added feature of the new ParagraphFour.com is The PIV Blog. As readers of the Quarterly Note are familiar, I have tried to keep the Quarterly Note informative and interesting with a tenor that is positive and upbeat. I will bring this same attitude towards the PIV Blog. However, for those unfamiliar with the Quarterly Note, the Note was the 2004 version of a blog post (maybe I was just ahead of my time). It was just mailed to everyone as well as posted on the site as a pdf file. Of course, it appeared every quarter.

Posts to The PIV Blog will be more frequent. The PIV Market does not merit a daily blogging site, so I anticipate posting a new blog every 2-3 weeks. The content of The PIV Blog will be similar to the Quarterly Note — I tend to cover topics from a broader perspective of the PIV Market and introduce some of our proprietary research.

While I may discuss newsy type items or the occasional court ruling, there are many legal sites that cover this information, and ParagraphFour.com is not really a legal website though we the research PIV patent cases and how they affect the pharmaceutical business.

Database Enhancements
While I removed a few of the topics from the original ParagraphFour.com database, the new database essentially contains the same, easy-to-find information as the site has always provided. The site covers every PIV case filed since 2000, Inter Partes Reviews, and BPCIA cases as well as reports and analysis.

The key enhancement is the Search feature. The old version had a simple word search — while useable, it was pretty basic. The new search feature does partial word searches “live” — as you are typing. The search engine will find the partial word and then whole word you are looking for. It then will feed all of the hits on the site with the summary portions of them, making it easy for you to find what you are looking for. While a great enhancement, the Search feature may also be improved over time (see below).

The other enhancement is the readability of the new database. With the newer software, we can now control the size of font and appearance, making it easier to read on the screen and printed page.

Topic Feeds
Another feature is the three live topic feeds. When a new topic is posted, it appears on the right side of the site for easy reading. It will also provide a sample of our data. It will alert you to anything new posted, but, as a side note, are only of new topics — updates to current topics with a new PIV case to a product with other cases, for example, will not appear as a feed. If you are not a subscriber, there are over 800 product topics on the site and over 200 that are currently included active PIV cases.

Cell Phone Friendly
The new site is also designed to be easy-to-read and navigate with a cell phone. Though not an App for a phone, the site will enable you to pull some research from your phone including the downloads of court documents. Before or during a meeting, you will be able to pull up the site, find a product topic, and easily read clips of data.

More to Come
My team and I are not stopping here with the September 2019 re-launch of ParagraphFour.com. We are looking at its other possibilities including more robust search features as well as communication and interactions with the site to enhance a subscriber’s experience. Of course, nothing is really easy, but we will explore what can work, and where a good fit, add them to the site.

Please enjoy the re-launch of ParagraphFour.com!