Patents - Anyone tried, successfully/unsuccessfully

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Brewer Jon

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Hello All

I was just looking into how you patent a invention, lots of websites saying they will do all the work for you for a fee of course, thousands often. Then people say you can do it yourself for hundreds of pounds, but I haven't found a good manual so to speak of to follow. I was just wondering if anyone on here has tried, successfully or unsuccessfully. Just seems a bit wild west out there, with these companies, and just the whole system with the wording of the application. I was hoping to talk to someone who has been through the process at least I can here from someone who has tried it.

Also I was wondering about all the other fees, that I never really thought about, like maintenance fees.

Any replies will be much appreciated.

Regards

Jon
 
The Patent office (old name for them) is it IPO now? should have some self help info.

I came up with the idea for an auto fire button for a joystick in the 80's and discussed it at the place I worked on occasion. Unfortunatly not too long after autofiring joysticks hit the market. It may have been a coincidence but the number one golden rule would be to not discuss with anyone casually. I have also designed a selfsupporting cable / power management system and even had them made up for my old employer but that wasn't worth patenting.
 
Talk to a decent patents lawyer - initial 1/2 hour meeting/zoom/telephone conversation may be free. They will give you general info and cost (including their fees) and you can decide then if it's worth pursuing. They shouldn't ask what your idea is at this stage. They should give you an idea of whether your invention is patentable (in their experience), what it means once you have the patent in place and future costs of maintaining and pursuing any breaches of the patent.

Once you decide to proceed, they can ask for info and deal with the application or guide you through the application yourself (latter would be cheaper).
 
As others have said above patents are expensive and in my opinion should only be pursued if you can afford to prosecute copies.
You obviously believe there is a commercial opportunity with your invention that will pay back the cost of the patent? And you have the wherewithal to manufacture your invention to provide a profitable income?
There are a couple of alternative routes you could explore. First identify a company that would exploit your invention to the fullest and approach them with a NDA to discuss your invention with a view to let them patent it and you receive either a one off payment or a percentage of sales.
Alternatively, you can register the design that doesn't give you the same protections as a patent but makes it more difficult for a company to patent your idea as it's been disclosed. Depends on the motivation behind the desire to patent. During my career we used patents to make life difficult for our competitors and had corporate money to play with. I don't think you're in that boat, are you?
 
If you haven't already I would suggest before entering any conversations with patent lawyers or similar that you do a patent search for similar ideas. If anyone has patented or has had a similar idea you may not be able to patent your idea. For your idea to be patentable it has to be completely unique and not be in the public domain. If someone can show 'Prior Art', (ie they thought of it before you), you could spend a lot of money on something that becomes un-patentable.

If you do want to discuss it with anyone as Buffers says get them to sign a NDA, (Non disclosure agreement).

Here's a link to some information.

Prior Art
 
The Patent office (old name for them) is it IPO now? should have some self help info.

I came up with the idea for an auto fire button for a joystick in the 80's and discussed it at the place I worked on occasion. Unfortunatly not too long after autofiring joysticks hit the market. It may have been a coincidence but the number one golden rule would be to not discuss with anyone casually. I have also designed a selfsupporting cable / power management system and even had them made up for my old employer but that wasn't worth patenting.

That sucks, your employer not patenting it.

Please PM me details of your idea, together with drawings etc, and I will let you know if it is worth pursuing ;)

Ok, and bank details too? :P

Talk to a decent patents lawyer - initial 1/2 hour meeting/zoom/telephone conversation may be free. They will give you general info and cost (including their fees) and you can decide then if it's worth pursuing. They shouldn't ask what your idea is at this stage. They should give you an idea of whether your invention is patentable (in their experience), what it means once you have the patent in place and future costs of maintaining and pursuing any breaches of the patent.

Once you decide to proceed, they can ask for info and deal with the application or guide you through the application yourself (latter would be cheaper).
As others have said above patents are expensive and in my opinion should only be pursued if you can afford to prosecute copies.
You obviously believe there is a commercial opportunity with your invention that will pay back the cost of the patent? And you have the wherewithal to manufacture your invention to provide a profitable income?
There are a couple of alternative routes you could explore. First identify a company that would exploit your invention to the fullest and approach them with a NDA to discuss your invention with a view to let them patent it and you receive either a one off payment or a percentage of sales.
Alternatively, you can register the design that doesn't give you the same protections as a patent but makes it more difficult for a company to patent your idea as it's been disclosed. Depends on the motivation behind the desire to patent. During my career we used patents to make life difficult for our competitors and had corporate money to play with. I don't think you're in that boat, are you?
If you haven't already I would suggest before entering any conversations with patent lawyers or similar that you do a patent search for similar ideas. If anyone has patented or has had a similar idea you may not be able to patent your idea. For your idea to be patentable it has to be completely unique and not be in the public domain. If someone can show 'Prior Art', (ie they thought of it before you), you could spend a lot of money on something that becomes un-patentable.

If you do want to discuss it with anyone as Buffers says get them to sign a NDA, (Non disclosure agreement).

Here's a link to some information.

Prior Art

I forgot about NDAs. I don't have deep pockets to take big companies to court if they steal my idea :( That's one of the things that annoy me with the patent system, seems to work if you got big pockets to have fancy lawyers to fight it out in the courts. It seems to come down to how you word it on the patent.

If it did work (I haven't built anything yet) I don't have the capital or knowledge to build my invention so I would be looking to license it in some way to a company to use. Bit like the Black and Decker workmate man, he got 50p for everyone, doesn't sound much, but when they have sold 60 million, I wouldn't complain.
 
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