PRESS RELEASE #99-33 Friday, December  10, 1999 CONTACT:   Morrie Goodman Pat Woodward (202)482-4883 Brigid Quinn (703)305-8341 SECRETARY DALEY AWARDS 6 MILLIONTH PATENT TO STATE-OF-THE-ART INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY INVENTION WASHINGTON, D.C. - Secretary of Commerce William M. Daley and Assistant Secretary of Commerce and Commissioner of Patents and Trademarks, Q. Todd Dickinson, today awarded the 6 millionth U.S. patent to Palm Computing, Inc., a 3 Com company, for its HotSync technology. Alan Kessler, President of Palm Computing, accepted the patent in a morning ceremony at the Department’s Herbert C. Hoover Building. The HotSync technology allows users of a handheld device based on the Palm Computing platform to synchronize their information with a computer at a single touch of a button. The HotSync technology provides for fast, easy backup of data and the ability to put the most up-to-date information from a desktop computer or server into the pocket or purse of the user. "Lightning quick advances in computer-related technology are one of the main drivers of this nation's thriving economy," said Commerce Secretary William M. Daley. "Unprecedented progress in science and technology also continue to shorten the time it takes our patent system to log new patents. It took some 80 years to get from patent number 1 to patent 1 million. It has taken only one tenth of that time to go from 5 to 6 million patents." "It is no coincidence that the United States has both the strongest patent system and strongest economy in the world,” noted Commissioner of Patents and Trademarks, Q. Todd Dickinson. “Our patent system has nurtured this country's evolution from an agrarian economy, through the industrial revolution, and into today’s information age. Palm’s HotSync technology is an emblem of the new economy.” Patent number 1 was issued in 1836. Earlier patents were not numbered, although the first patent was issued in 1790. Last year the Patent and Trademark Office, a bureau of the Department of Commerce, issued 161,000 patents. -##-