A USPTO provisional patent application simply secures your ‘spot in line’ or patent priority date to a later patent application filing. After you file a provisional application, you will have one-year to follow with a non-provisional (full) patent application to maintain the patent priority date secured by the non-provisional. It’s important to secure your patent priority date since the…
What if you come up with ‘new subject matter’ for your invention after you’ve already filed a non-provisional? No problem – the USPTO accounts for this and allows what is known as “continuation-in-part” (CIP) applications. CIP applications allow you to expand the scope of your patent application while it’s still pending, without losing the patent…
Do I need international patent protection? Though the location of manufacture is an important consideration for international patent protection, I would ask: “Where do you plan to sell your product?” If your product is to be sold around the world, you should be considering international patent protection immediately for several reasons. Let’s say you are…
Here’s 7 Things to know about Patent Rights – #4 is what most people DON’T know, #1 is the most important to know, and #7 reflects a recent change to our patent laws. Our Patent laws have seen some fundamental changes with the recently enacted America Invents Act. Whether you have a large patent portfolio…
You’ve been working on a novel technology. Due to the positive impact of my technology, you get new connections and they are willing to collaborate with you all the time. Since you have not filed a patent on it yet, you are concerned of protecting your IP and scared of disclosing any of your secret…
Let’s say you came up with a novel design for a boombox or a watch. Although this newly designed boombox or watch may be ‘inventive’ from the utilitarian standpoint, a utility patent may not protect the physical design of your product as it would protect the corresponding function. This article considers protecting product designs that may be functional, but…
Now, when you file a non-provisional application, you have a choice of whether or not you want the application to be made available to the public for review (i.e., published). If the application is published, but you are not granted a patent, the subject matter of your application enters the public domain. If you choose…
In order to transfer patent rights from an inventor (Assignor) to an entity (Assignee), the inventor must sign an assignment agreement. Upon execution, the assignment agreement become a legally binding and enforceable contract. With the assignment, each inventor transfers the patent rights embodied in the patent or patent application to the Assignee. In turn,the Assignee…
Our new patent laws grant the first inventor to file for a patent priority to any patent rights available to that invention. Before, our laws allowed an inventor to prove his date of conception to gain priority to the patent rights, even if the inventor was not the first to file for a patent on…
In the US, provisional patent applications are kept as confidential documents, away from public availability. There is no publically accessible database in which you can search or verify provisional patent filings. This is to protect and preserve your rights while your product is still in the beta/development phase. It also allows you to let the…
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