How To Get Something Patent

Frequently Asked Questions: Patents

Basics

A patent is an exclusive right granted for an invention. In other words, a patent is an exclusive right to a product or a process that generally provides a new fashion of doing something, or offers a new technical solution to a problem. To go a patent, technical information about the invention must exist disclosed to the public in a patent awarding.

The patent owner may give permission to, or license, other parties to utilise the invention on mutually agreed terms. The owner may also sell the right to the invention to someone else, who will then become the new possessor of the patent. Once a patent expires, the protection ends, and an invention enters the public domain; that is, anyone can commercially exploit the invention without infringing the patent.

A patent owner has the right to decide who may – or may non – employ the patented invention for the period in which the invention is protected. In other words, patent protection means that the invention cannot be commercially made, used, distributed, imported, or sold past others without the patent owner'south consent.

Patents may be granted for inventions in whatsoever field of technology, from an everyday kitchen utensil to a nanotechnology chip. An invention can be a product – such as a chemical compound, or a process, for case – or a process for producing a specific chemical compound. Many products in fact contain a number of inventions. For example, a laptop computer can involve hundreds of inventions, working together.

Patent protection is granted for a express flow, mostly xx years from the filing appointment of the application.

Patents are territorial rights. In general, the sectional rights are merely applicable in the state or region in which a patent has been filed and granted, in accordance with the law of that country or region.

Patent rights are normally enforced in a court on the initiative of the right owner. In almost systems a courtroom of law has the authority to stop patent infringement. However the chief responsibility for monitoring, identifying, and taking action against infringers of a patent lies with the patent owner.

Licensing a patent only ways that the patent possessor grants permission to some other individual/organization to make, use, sell etc. his/her patented invention. This takes place according to agreed terms and weather condition (for example, defining the amount and type of payment to exist fabricated past the licensee to the licensor), for a defined purpose, in a defined territory, and for an agreed period of time.

A patent owner may grant a license to a 3rd political party for many reasons. The patent owner may non have the necessary manufacturing facilities, for case, and therefore opts to allow others to make and sell his/her patented invention in render for "royalty" payments. Alternatively, a patent owner may accept manufacturing facilities, but they may not be large plenty to cover market place demand. In this case, he/she may be interested in licensing the patent to another manufacturer in order to benefit from some other income stream. Another possible situation is one in which the patent owner wishes to concentrate on one geographic market; therefore the patent owner may choose to grant a license to another individual/organization, with interests in other geographical markets. Entering into a licensing agreement can help to build a mutually-benign business organization relationship.

Different selling or transferring a patent to another party, the licensor continue to have property rights over the patented invention.

Patented inventions have, in fact, pervaded every aspect of human life, from electric lighting (patents held by Edison and Swan) and plastic (patents held by Baekeland), to ballpoint pens (patents held by Biro), and microprocessors (patents held by Intel, for example).

Patents provide incentives to and protection for individuals by offering them recognition for their creativity and the possibility of textile advantage for their inventions. At the same time, the obligatory publication of patents and patent applications facilitates the mutually-beneficial spread of new knowledge and accelerates innovation activities by, for example, fugitive the necessity to "re-invent the bike".

Once knowledge is publicly available, past its nature, it can be used simultaneously by an unlimited number of persons. While this is, without doubtfulness, perfectly adequate for public information, it causes a dilemma for the commercialization of technical cognition. In the absenteeism of protection of such knowledge, "free-riders" could hands use technical knowledge embedded in inventions without whatsoever recognition of the creativity of the inventor or contribution to the investments fabricated past the inventor. As a effect, inventors would naturally be discouraged to bring new inventions to the market, and tend to keep their commercially valuable inventions underground. A patent organisation intends to correct such nether-provision of innovative activities by providing innovators with limited sectional rights, thereby giving the innovators the possibility to receive appropriate returns on their innovative activities.

In a wider sense, the public disclosure of the technical knowledge in the patent, and the exclusive correct granted by the patent, provide incentives for competitors to search for alternative solutions and to "invent around" the first invention. These incentives and the dissemination of knowledge about new inventions encourage further innovation, which assures that the quality of human life and the well-existence of society is continuously enhanced.

Applying for patent protection

In that location are numerous atmospheric condition that must exist met in order to obtain a patent and it is non possible to compile an exhaustive, universally applicable listing. Withal, some of the key atmospheric condition include the following:

The invention must show an element of novelty; that is, some new characteristic which is not known in the body of existing knowledge in its technical field. This body of existing noesis is chosen "prior art".
The invention must involve an "inventive step" or "not-obvious", which means that it could non be obviously deduced by a person having ordinary skill in the relevant technical field.
The invention must exist capable of industrial application, meaning that it must be capable of being used for an industrial or business purpose across a mere theoretical phenomenon, or exist useful.
Its subject thing must be accepted as "patentable" under law. In many countries, scientific theories, aesthetic creations, mathematical methods, plant or fauna varieties, discoveries of natural substances, commercial methods, methods for medical handling (equally opposed to medical products) or computer programs are generally not patentable.
The invention must be disclosed in an application in a mode sufficiently clear and complete to enable it to be replicated by a person with an ordinary level of skill in the relevant technical field.

In general, applicants can prepare their patent applications and file them without assist from a patent chaser. Nonetheless, given the complication of patent documents and the legal skills required, such as claim drafting, it is highly appropriate to seek legal assistance from a patent chaser/amanuensis when drafting a patent application.

Furthermore, the legislation of many countries requires that an applicant, whose ordinary residence or principal place of business is outside the land, be represented by an attorney or agent qualified in the land (which usually ways an amanuensis or attorney who resides and practices in that country). Information on the qualified attorneys and agents can be obtained straight from national and regional IP offices.

The costs vary considerably from country to country (and even inside a country). As the official fees vary widely from land to country, please contact the relevant national or regional patent office which volition be able to requite you details on the fee construction. Consult our list of national and regional intellectual property offices.

The cost of patenting an invention depends on factors such as the nature of the invention, its complexity, patent attorney'due south fees, the length of the application, and possible objections raised during the test by the patent part. Some countries offer discounts to small- and medium-sized enterprises and applicants filing the application online. In addition, some countries allow expedited examination upon payment of additional fees.

In addition to the national official filing fees, once a patent is granted by the patent role, you must pay maintenance or renewal fees, generally on an annual footing, to maintain the validity of the patent.

In case you decide to patent your invention away, you should too consider the relevant official filing fees for each country in question, the translation costs, and the costs of using local patent agents, which is a requirement in many countries for foreign applicants.

At nowadays, you lot cannot obtain a universal "world patent" or "international patent". Patents are territorial rights. In general, an application for a patent must be filed, and the patent granted and enforced, in each country in which you seek patent protection for your invention, in accordance with the law of that country. Therefore, i way of obtaining patents in a number of countries is to file a national patent application with each relevant national patent office.

In some regions, a regional patent office, for example, the European Patent Office (EPO) and the African Regional Intellectual Holding Organization (ARIPO), accepts regional patent applications, or grants patents. These have the same outcome every bit applications filed, or patents granted, in the member states of that region. This means that, in certain regions, you can obtain a regional patent from a regional patent role, which is valid in some or all of its member states.

If you are seeking patent protection in a number of countries worldwide, a good option is to file an international application under the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT), administered past WIPO. Whatever resident or national of a land party to the Per centum (contracting country) can file a unmarried international awarding which has the effect of a national patent application (and certain regional patent applications) in some or all Percentage contracting states. In some cases, this tin exist a more straightforward selection than choosing to try to submit individual applications in each and every country in which you require protection. Find out more about the PCT Organisation.

The outset step in securing a patent is the filing of a patent application. Many patent offices provide a specific form to fill in. In some patent offices, you can file a patent application on line.

In the patent awarding, in full general, you must depict the championship of the invention, every bit well every bit provide an indication of its technical field. You must likewise include the groundwork to and a description of the invention, in articulate linguistic communication and enough detail that a person with an boilerplate understanding of the field could use or reproduce the invention. Such descriptions are ordinarily accompanied past visual materials such as drawings, plans, or diagrams to better describe the invention and an abstract, which contains a brief summary of the invention. You must also clearly and concisely define the matter for which patent protection is sought in the "claims" part of the patent awarding.

In addition, depending on the applicable patent law, you may need to submit various kinds of statements, declarations or supporting documents to a patent office. In view of the complexity it is recommended that you consult a patent chaser or a patent agent to fix a patent application.

The procedures vary significantly from i land to another, and then information technology is incommunicable to provide an exhaustive step-past-pace overview. If you wish to research a country'due south legislation in the field of patents independently, you can browse the WIPO Lex database of intellectual holding (IP) legislation from around the world.

All the same it is recommended that y'all consult either a practicing lawyer specializing in IP or the relevant IP role. Consult our directory of national and regional IP offices.

The grant of a patent can be challenged either via a patent role or in a court of law. A court may invalidate or revoke a patent upon a successful claiming by a tertiary party. In addition, many patent offices provide administrative procedures that allow third parties to oppose to the grant of a patent (including so-chosen "opposition systems"), for example, on the ground that the claimed invention is not new or does non involve an inventive stride.

Procedures for challenging patents differ from country to land. Find out more most opposition systems.

In some countries, patent protection may exist extended across 20 years or a Supplementary Protection Certificate (SPC) may be issued in very specific cases. The extension aims to compensate for the time expended on the administrative approval procedure earlier products tin be put on the marketplace. The time taken for this procedure means that the patent possessor may sometimes not be able to do good from his right for a considerable period of time after the grant of the patent.

Mayhap, but laws and practices in this regard tin differ from one land or region to another. For example, in some countries, "inventions" within the meaning of patent law must have a "technical character". In other countries, such requirements do non be, meaning that in these countries software is generally patentable subject matter.

However this does not mean that all software volition be able to be patent protected. In order to obtain a patent, a software invention must not autumn under other not-patentable subject area matter (for instance, abstract ideas or mathematical theories) and has to fulfill the other noun patentability criteria (for case, novelty, inventive stride [non-obviousness] and industrial applicability [usefulness]).

Information technology is therefore recommended that you consult a practicing lawyer specializing in intellectual property or the intellectual belongings offices of those countries in which you lot are interested in obtaining protection. Consult our directory of national and regional intellectual property offices to become in contact with a local IP professional person, or scan the WIPO Lex database of intellectual property legislation from effectually the world.

Detect out more about using patents to protect software and business methods.

Should a patent turn out non to be a viable option for your software-related invention, then using copyright as a means of protection may be an alternative. In general, reckoner programs are protected under copyright equally literary works. The protection starts with the creation or fixation of the work, such as software or a webpage. Moreover, in general, yous are not required to register or deposit copies of a work in order to obtain copyright protection.

However, according to a well-established principle, copyright protection extends only to expressions, not to ideas, procedures, methods of operation, or mathematical concepts as such. Thus many companies protect the object lawmaking of computer programs by copyright, while the source code is kept as a trade hush-hush. Notice out more most copyright.

Whether yous can obtain patent protection for an app depends on which element of your app you wish to protect. If you desire to protect a technical idea or feature relating to the app, patent protection is a potential option. Depending on the applicable national law, the software that runs your app may be able to be protected by patents if it has sure technical features. You must be mindful however that your technical idea must see all of the patentability requirements to obtain patent protection, and it may have years to get a patent.

In improver, it is of import to ask yourself which element(s) of your app should be protected from free use past competitors. The software that runs your app can be protected by copyright (potentially also by patents, as described above). If you are interested in protecting logos or signs contained within your app however, y'all should consider protecting them using trademarks. Literary and artistic works included within your app, such equally original databases, musical works, audiovisual works, works of fine art and photographs, are protected by copyright. Graphical objects and layouts tin can be protected using industrial designs.

Find more about the various types of intellectual belongings rights.

Please meet the questions and answers under the topic "Patent Information ", in particular, the answer to the question "Where tin can I detect patent information ?".

WIPO Lex provides easy access to intellectual property legislation from a wide range of countries and regions besides equally to treaties on intellectual belongings.

Many national or regional patent offices also provide information concerning national or regional legislation on their websites. Consult our list of national and regional intellectual property offices.

Confidentiality

No. Patents are granted by patent offices in exchange for a full disclosure of the invention. In full general, the details of the invention are then published and made available to the public at large.

Information technology should be noted that publication tin have place at diverse stages of the procedure. In some countries, the patent certificate is only published afterward the granting of a patent. In other countries, patent applications are generally published eighteen months from the filing date or, where priority has been claimed, the priority appointment (for more details, meet the website of your national IP office).

It is important to file a patent application before publicly disclosing the details of an invention. In full general, any invention which is made public before an application is filed would be considered "prior art " (although the definition of the term "prior art" is not uniform at the international level, in many countries, it refers to any information which has been made available to the public anywhere in the world by written or oral disclosure before the filing date).

In countries which apply the in a higher place definition of the term "prior art", an applicant'south public disclosure of an invention prior to filing a patent application would prevent him/her from obtaining a valid patent for that invention, since the invention would not comply with the novelty requirement. Some countries, nevertheless, allow for a grace period – normally betwixt 6 and 12 months – which provides a safeguard for applicants who disclosed their inventions before filing a patent application. Further, the novelty criteria may be interpreted differently depending on the applicative law.

If disclosing your invention before filing a patent application is unavoidable – for example, to a potential investor or a business partner – then any disclosure should be accompanied by a confidentiality or non-disclosure understanding. Information technology should also be kept in mind that applying early for patent protection will generally be helpful when seeking financial support to commercialize an invention.

Patents and business concern

While it is certainly true that not all enterprises develop patentable inventions, it is a wrong to believe that patents just apply to complex physical or chemical processes and products or that they are only useful to large corporations. Patents can be obtained for any area of engineering science from paper clips to computers.

Moreover, when people think of patents, what ordinarily comes to mind are major scientific breakthroughs such as Edison's get-go electric lamp, or large corporations investing in research and evolution. Only, in fact, most patents aren't granted for groundbreaking scientific breakthroughs, but rather for inventions that make improvements to existing inventions. For example the second or 3rd generation of a product or a process, that works in a more cost-effective or efficient manner.

Certain countries likewise accept specific legal provisions for protecting incremental innovations. These are called utility models and they tend to have a shorter elapsing than patents and are generally easier to obtain.

Exclusive rights: Patents provide you with an sectional correct to prevent or stop others from commercially exploiting an invention for xx years from the date of filing of the patent application.
Return on investments: Having invested a considerable amount of money and time in developing innovative products, through sectional patent rights, you may be able to establish yourself in the market as the pre-eminent thespian and to obtain higher returns on investments.
Opportunity to license or sell the invention: If you lot choose not to exploit the patent yourself, y'all may sell it or license the commercialization of the patented invention to another enterprise, which could and so be a source of income for your company.
Increment in negotiating power: If your company is in the process of acquiring the rights to use the patents of another enterprise through a licensing contract, your patent portfolio volition enhance your bargaining power. That is to say, your patents may prove to be of considerable involvement to the enterprise with which you are negotiating, and y'all could enter into a cantankerous-licensing system where, merely put, your enterprise and the other hold to license respective patents to each other.
Positive image for your enterprise: Business concern partners, investors and shareholders may perceive patent portfolios every bit a demonstration of the high level of expertise, specialization, and technological capacity inside your company. This may prove useful for raising funds, finding concern partners and raising your company's market value.

If you lot don't patent your invention, competitors may well accept reward of it. If the product is successful, many other competitor firms will exist tempted to make the same product by using your invention without needing to ask for your permission. Larger enterprises may take reward of economies of scale to produce the product more cheaply and compete at a more favorable market place price. This may considerably reduce your company's market share for that product. Fifty-fifty small competing enterprises may be able to produce the same production, and frequently sell information technology at a lower price equally they would non have to recoup the original enquiry and development costs incurred by your company.

But that's non all. The possibilities to license, sell or transfer technology will exist severely hindered if you don't patent your invention; indeed, without intellectual property (patent) rights, transfers of technology would be difficult if not impossible. The transfer of technology assumes that one or more parties take legal ownership of a technology and this can just be finer obtained through appropriate intellectual property (IP) protection. Without IP protection for the engineering science in question, all sides tend to be suspicious of disclosing their inventions during technology transfer talks, fearing that the other side may "run away with the invention".

Finally, you lot take to consider the possibility that someone else may patent your invention outset. The first person or enterprise to file a patent for an invention will take the right to the patent. This may in fact hateful that, if yous do not patent your inventions or inventions made the employees of your company, somebody else – who may accept adult the same or an equivalent invention subsequently – may do and so. Thus they could legitimately exclude your enterprise from the market, limit your activities to the continuation of prior use (where the patent legislation provides for such an exception), or ask your visitor to pay a licensing fee for using the invention.

However, to ensure that no i is able to patent your invention, instead of filing a patent application, you may disembalm the invention to the public so that it becomes prior art for any patent application that will be filed after your publication, thereby placing information technology in the public domain (normally known equally defensive publication). Because of the being of such prior fine art, later filed patent applications containing the same or like invention will be refused by a patent office on the grounds of the lack of novelty or inventive step. At the same time, if y'all disclose your invention earlier filing a patent application, you will severely limit your possibility of obtaining patent protection on that invention.

Each situation is unique, so there is no one "correct" way to become near licensing a patent. In some countries, a patent applicant's intention to grant a license to third parties can be published in the official gazette. To notice out more, get in touch with your national IP role.

In general all the same, information technology is possible to say that if you intend to license your patent, what is important is diligent training. Earlier starting negotiation with a potential licensee, you should be informed of the current situation and future prospects of the relevant market and technology. Moreover, you should notice out about the commercial land of a potential licensee and the associated financial value of your patent, etc. You should reflect on your own business objectives and carefully consider how entering into a licensing agreement fits into your short- and long-term business concern strategies.

In many cases, where an enterprise has only improved an existing production and the said improvement is not sufficiently inventive to be deemed patentable, utility models may correspond a skillful alternative, if available in the country in question. On occasions, information technology may be advisable for your company to go on its innovations as trade secrets which requires, in particular, that sufficient measures are taken to go on the information confidential.

Another culling strategy could exist to ensure that no one is able to patent your invention by disclosing it (commonly known as defensive publication), thereby assuring its identify in the public domain. Nonetheless, you should carefully reverberate on using this strategy, since if you disclose your invention before filing a patent application, y'all will severely limit your possibility to obtain patent protection.

In about countries, if an employee has developed an invention in execution of his/her employment contract – i.due east. normally during his/her working time within the enterprise – the invention (and the related patent rights) will belong to the enterprise. To avoid confusion and possible disputes, employers oftentimes specify issues of intellectual property ownership in employment contracts. Depending on the claim of the instance, the employee may, however, have a right to equitable remuneration in accord with legislative provisions or the employment contract. In whatsoever case, the employee volition always retain the right to exist mentioned as the inventor, unless he/she expressly renounces this right.

Patent information

Patent data commonly refers to the information plant in patent applications and granted patents. This information may include bibliographic data about the inventor and patent applicant or patent holder, a description of the claimed invention and related developments in the field of technology, and a listing of claims indicating the scope of patent protection sought past the applicant.

Simply why would patent applicants disembalm such extensive information near their inventions? The reason is that the patent arrangement balances the exclusive rights granted to a patent holder over an invention with the obligation to publicly disclose data about the newly developed technology.

The requirement that a patent applicant disclose data virtually their invention(s) is very important for the continuous evolution of the engineering. This information provides a basis on which new technical solutions can be developed by other inventors. Without publication at that place would be no style for the public to get information about new technical developments. It is therefore non surprising that providing data for the public is a key task of industrial property offices.

Patent documents contain technological data that is often not divulged in any other grade of publication, covering practically every field of engineering. They take a relatively standardized format and are classified co-ordinate to technical fields to brand identifying relevant documents even easier (for more data, come across "Full general Information on the International Patent Classification System "). All in all, they are a vast shop of easily accessible human knowledge.

The data contained in patent documents tin can be very useful to researchers, entrepreneurs, and many others, helping them:

avoid duplication of enquiry and development work;
build on and improve existing products or processes;
appraise the state-of-the-fine art in a specific technological field, e.g. to get an idea of the latest developments in this field;
evaluate the patentability of inventions, in detail the novelty and inventiveness of inventions (important criteria for determining their patentability), with a view to applying for patent protection domestically or away;
identify inventions protected by patents, in particular to avoid infringement and seek opportunities for licensing;
monitor activities of potential partners and competitors both within the state and abroad; and
identify market niches or detect new trends in technology or product development at an early stage.

Patent documents are published past national and regional patent offices, ordinarily 18 months afterward the appointment on which a patent awarding was first filed or once a patent has been granted for the invention claimed by the patent bidder. Some patent offices publish patent documents through free-of-accuse online databases, making it easier than ever to access patent information.

WIPO's PATENTSCOPE database provides costless-of-charge online access to millions of international patent applications filed under the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) System as well as patent documents filed at national and regional patent offices such equally the European Patent Office and the United States Patent and Trademark Function.

Though accessibility of patent data has grown as more and more patent offices make their patent documents available through online databases, certain skills are yet required in order to make effective use of this information, including conveying out targeted patent searches and providing meaningful analysis of patent search results. As a result, it may be advisable to contact a patent data professional for assistance where business organization-critical decisions are at pale.

WIPO Patent Information Services (WPIS) provide free-of-accuse patent search services for individuals and institutions in developing countries.

WIPO also supports the institution and development of Technology and Innovation Support Centers (TISCs), which provide patent information and related services in many countries around the world.

WIPO has issued a series of free-of-accuse publications related to the discipline, including Finding Engineering science Using Patents and the WIPO Guide to Using Patent Information .

WIPO and patents

WIPO works to develop a balanced and effective international intellectual property (IP) system, a cardinal part of which is dedicated to patents. WIPO'south member states collaborate in diverse areas, including on agreeing the treaties and conventions that underpin the international IP system and that brand the global exchange of creativity and innovation possible. The IP services that WIPO offers, such as the facilitation of international patent protection under the Percent System, complement services available at the national and/or regional level. It's important to remember that WIPO does not actually grant patents per se; the grant or refusal of a patent nonetheless rests with the relevant national or regional patent office.