Patent Attorney and Founder
Here’s a quick question for you have you ever seen one of those coffee mugs people carry around something like this you know a Contigo or different brand there’s a little simple button on the back is this patented do you think
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welcome to the show of is your idea patentable this is certainly patented and many products on the market today are and so I encourage you in your everyday today maybe even today right take a look around at some of the products maybe even in your own house that you might not have thought had patents on them one great way to tell is to look at the bottom okay take a look this thing says of course with dishwasher safe and do not microwave right there at the bottom it says patents see ignite patents.com let’s see if I can zoom in and get a shot of that
so on that website of course articulates not just one but over 20 pets that are involved in that mug I’m JD hooverner I’m a registered USPTO patent attorney and I’m a managing partner and CEO here at bold Patton’s Law Firm I’m here to talk with you about that simple and yet complex question of is my idea patentable what I’ve done in this video is provide for you some time stamps along the way so you can fast forward and find the spot the issue that you might specifically have along the way so the first order of business is to look into ideas okay ideas you ask is my idea patentable and I talk about this in other videos too and I won’t go on forever but ideas are done but doesn’t I hear them all the time okay the question is do you have an invention an invention is you being able to articulate even if it’s verbally about what your invention is and how you can make it how you can bring it into reality and again you don’t have to have a prototype don’t get me wrong you don’t have to build something especially if it’s going to to be very onerous and require a lot of equipment Financial injection being able to describe it describe how your invention could be built it can’t just be this fanciful oh I I wish it was this way but I don’t know how to make it well you’ve got a great idea you don’t yet have an adventure so I’d like to restructure the title to be is my invention patentable okay so to get a patent here you have to prove three things novelty non-obviousness and utility novelty means you’ve got to be first of its kind in the world so you work with us to put ourselves in the shoes of a patent examiner to see whether there’s any prior art anything ever published anything ever patented that covers the same subject matter that you’ve invented we’ve got to make sure not only is it new but what you’ve got is not an obvious variant of something else already done utility they want to provide and make sure that what you’ve actually done here achieves something has some benefit and and this is a fairly low bar but you got to make sure that it’s achievable in today’s world so we’re going to talk about some fun examples there it’s one quick note as we’re talking about all the requirements and what it means to it is your idea patentable one thing to think about too is that even if it is novel non-obvious and has utility you may not want to follow the patent this is if in the case that it may fall into trade secret protection and the essential question okay don’t miss out on this is when you sell your product right when it gets in the consumer’s hands is it reverse engineerable right can they take it apart and figure out how you made it or is it something that they really couldn’t figure out no matter how hard they try there’s no way they could do it and you’re certain of that if it’s the latter you may not need to seek patent protection okay but if it is reverse engineerable it’s easily picked up something quite simple you’ve got to lock it down with patent protection we’re gonna have a separate video All About Trade Secrets but I want to make sure to flag that issue for you before we move on what the examiners are going to look at is making sure that your invention is sort of above and beyond right incrementally different and improving over and above what’s called prior art prior art is sort of a term that’s used to define anything that’s ever been published anything that’s available to a person of ordinary skill in the art so someone like you an inventor just like you in a different part of the country or the world for that matter what information do they have right what do they use what magazines do they read what books do they read what information online do they have at their fingertips that’s the information that the patent examiner is going to be able to take a look at when they make their assessment on whether your invention is different enough right is not just subscribe in those writings okay so let’s take another look at this utility requirement utility means that it must have demonstrate or demonstrating some utility showing that you’re able to apply some benefit so a very kind of a fun story for you uh it’s not actually one of my clients but it’s a great story from the patent literature and the patent you know War Stories one issue that came up in the past 10 years 15 years is a chemical device that was used to spray on a bald head be able to show hair regrowth okay and so for many years I’ve had applications for hair growth formulas were rejected because they made the claim that they could regrow hair on a bald head right and so the examiners would say no based on your description and based on this it’s I there’s no evidence you can do this so in rare cases examiners will make you proven and so that’s what happened eventually enough scientific evidence was gathered they would attach it as an affidavit to the patent application to get around and over the objection from The Examiner one more example here is Pharmaceuticals and this is a huge one many of our clients that we work with are developing new drugs having new Medical Treatments and therapeutic Diagnostics they make pretty sweeping claims as an example available to lower the cholesterol of a particular patient with certain demographics and enzymes and proteins this is difficult right to be able to just say flat out based on this chemical structure if this is ingested it will lower cholesterol and certain of course LDL and HDL won’t get into those specifics but in order to make that claim the examiner will almost always make you provide an affidavit with detailed experimentation results you know showing a certified test was performed and those results were achieved before you’re allowed to get a claim last but not least we we’ve only gotten a couple of these uh but we work with clients that make really broad claims about perpetual motion machines being able to generate electricity at no end right and it’s one of those jokes in the patent Community about perpetual motion machines but it is it is one area that is yet to be of course uh overcome because it defies physics as we know it so we’ve certainly had our share of inventors that just prompts and they they want honest to put perpetual motion or generates electricity at zero at 100 efficiency and so examiners are going to reject it based on lack of utility so we need to help examine come up with some evidence and specimen and provided but when it comes down to it it’s never possible to generate it because it’s not physically possible to do that so that’s an area that is classically been rejected under the utility doctrine that third requirement of novelty non-obviousness has to have utility be able to demonstrate it in most cases so I’m happy to be able to provide this information for you listeners one thing I need to make sure I do is invite you to please share this with someone that you might know right inventor someone is just a tinker right a garage person you think you may not necessarily know what they’re working on do you suspect they’ve got an invention up their sleeve send this video to them forward it whether it be social media email the link like the video comment below so let them know right pay it forward and share this video so we can help other inventors out there looking for information just like you I’m happy to be able to present this information what I need you to do is follow up if you’re ready to make a decision if you’ve watched this whole video I know you’re ready you’ve got more than an idea I’m betting you’ve got an invention and it’s a matter of just willing yourself to just take that risk take that bold step and talk with a professional about moving forward to making the next step the next step for you is going to be to go to our website bold ip.com I’ve laid out a lot of free resources for you to use if you need that extra support the extra guidance and information pick up your free copy of bold ideas the adventure’s guide to patents but once you’re ready book a free consultation with one of our advisors and get started today again I’m JD hoovener managing partner and owner here at bold Patton’s Law Firm it’s my pleasure to talk with you I’m so glad you made the decision to go big go bold
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