Colorado U.S. Senator Michael Bennet today visited Grand Junction-based GPD Global, Inc., where he toured the facility and highlighted how Colorado’s new satellite patent office will benefit businesses and local economies on the Western Slope. The Commerce Department announced in July it would open a new U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in the Denver metro region.

“Colorado has a deeply embedded culture of innovation that has helped establish our state as a destination for inventors and entrepreneurs,” Bennet said. “Innovative businesses like GPD Global here in Colorado and throughout the Rocky Mountain West will benefit from having a nearby patent office, where they can meet with patent examiners and have their patent applications processed quicker. The new office will allow these companies to focus on generating new ideas and technologies to maintain the United States’ place as an economic leader in the world.

“The patent office will also encourage our state to regularly recognize our broad community of inventors, inspiring Colorado kids to look for ways to innovate and come up with improvements that impact our daily lives.”

Bennet led collaborative efforts over the past two years to secure a satellite patent office in Colorado. He led several letters from the Colorado Delegation to President Obama, USPTO Director David Kappos, and Commerce Secretaries Gary Locke and John Bryson, urging them to consider Colorado for a job-creating satellite office. Last year, he secured an amendment, cosponsored by Colorado U.S. Senator Mark Udall, in the patent reform law that empowers the USPTO to establish three new satellite patent offices across the country by 2014.

Part of those efforts also included a report Patent Attorney John Posthumus, Bennet’s office, the Metro Denver Economic Development Corporation, and the Colorado business community compiled, which included an economic study that estimates a satellite office in Denver would bring hundreds of direct jobs and even more indirect jobs, as well as lead to economic activity totaling $440 million over the first five years of operation.