OT: Has anyone here applied for a Design Patent?, I need to know how to go about it. Options

[Dr. Roger]

=)
Step by step.


I have this idea and now have access to the required technology. This process may make it possible that particular 914 replacement parts could be created. But I need to get my design idea patented before I do anything else.

Your shared experience is greatly appreciated.

I can be contacted directly at
roger@grubb.net

Thanks,
Roger

[r_towle]

I would think about filing for a provisional patent.

This is the first step, and gives you a whole year to dig deeper, build some really good arguements, and possibly even see if the idea is viable.

the provisional patent is basically a date holder, so you still need to use NDA paperwork to protect the idea from someone who may steal it.

Otherwise, it locks in the date of the initial provisional patent (when and if you ever get a utility patents)

Rich

[cooltimes]

=)
Step by step.


I have this idea and now have access to the required technology. This process may make it possible that particular 914 replacement parts could be created. But I need to get my design idea patented before I do anything else.

Your shared experience is greatly appreciated.

I can be contacted directly at
roger@grubb.net

Thanks,
Roger

Use this information at your risk.
The 1st step is talk to a patent attorney. Some may give you a free initial visit.
He will tell you what you need to do. Your project needs to be sketched and have a written description by you on your initial attorney visit. He will not be allowed to tell you if it is a cause worthy of your expense but great ideas make great patents.
The patent attorney will then hire someone in Washington DC that will charge a sum to search for patentability at the patent office related to your invention (design). Be prepared to pay up front for these services. Probably looking at least $2K - $3K for the artwork, secretarial aspects, search and the right to patent. Mine always took about 1 1/2 years from start to issue date of each of my patents.
The patent will be on shaky ground if you discuss it in a public manner. Secret is a myth but a good idea to keep it between you and your attorney.

[John]

As I understand it, this is a very expensive process.

If you are serious, you will need a patent attorney.

an exerp:

Patents cost money - something that’s often in short supply at startups and small companies, particularly in today’s tough economic climate. It can cost between $8,000 and $100,000 to procure patent protection for an invention in the United States. Those fees include the cost of preparing the patent application and the subsequent costs to convince the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office that the application should be issued as a patent. If foreign patent protection is desired, there are additional fees.

Once you obtain a patent, I understand that there are "maintenance fees" to keep the patent.

Do some on-line searching.

Good luck to you.

[lotus_65]

I'm in the process of writing a business method patent. That and all the work going into my start up is really hard, and I wish you good luck with your product. I wouldn't worry too much about the cost of a patent. As I understand it, the expensive ones are medical devices and such.

It might help to write a dedicated business plan that encapsulates your idea if the product has long-term merit (I assume it does or you wouldn't be chasing it), if you haven't yet.
I have been working with S.C.O.R.E. here in Minneapolis. You can and assess the viability of your product and solicit financing to support it.

Neither of us will likely get rich off our ideas, but if we have the fortitude to go with the imagination, I think it's a way out of the hand-to-mouth existence of a working class life.

Good Luck!
Paul

[burton73]

Roger,

As a person that not only has patents but make and markets my own products world wide I can tell you that today it takes much longer to get a patent than it did 7 years ago.

The one year filling that Rich is going over comes and goes very fast. You need to do your home work and see what prior art there is on the web at

http://www.uspto.gov/

This is a down and dirty filling but you still need the forms filled out and get the drawings done. If you look over other peoples patents you can get a very good idea.

You have it easy now. In the old days I had to go down to the head library in downtown L.A. Remember, when people got there patents on molding materials and process they went very wide in there claims. I do not why a 914 would be different than anything like say what I mold or any car part in any process or what is taught at say Art Center in Pasadena?

Go to the web and look. See if what you want to do is done.

Good luck.

Bob

[i love porsche]

in highschool i came up with an idea for a lifeboat release system, since an actual patent was too expensive for me, i looked into getting a preliminary patent. a preliminary patent covers you for a period of 1 year, and is only 99 dollars or something, so you can really test and try out whatever you are doing to see if its worth the investment.

you need drawings and writeups, but its all doable, unfortunately my patent never went through because my "partner" never held up his end of the deal...it sucks working with people sometimes. but look into getting a preliminary patent to start off with

[Matt Romanowski]

Use the goodle patent search - it's much easier and faster than the uspto one. Also, IMHO, provisional and disclosures are more or less useless. Also remember that we are now on first to file, not first to invent.

If I recall correctly, design patents are much easier. They are only patenting the "look" of something. Take a look at someone elses design patent to get an idea of what is involved. Check out this one we're all familiar with

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?...p;RS=PN/D464977

[Porcharu]

Good luck! I am still waiting for my patent to approved (5 plus years so far) and this was with a big company behind me.

Even after you get a patent you need the money to go after someone that steals our idea. It might be better to keep our idea as a trade secret if it will only be for 914 parts.

[JWest]

From the SCORE site:

1. The first thing to do with a new idea is to get a patent.
Wrong. Mere ideas are not patentable. Only useful products and processes can be patented, and you have to be able to describe it with such completeness as to enable others to make or practice and use it.

2. If my product has not been on the market before, I can patent it.
Wrong. That’s not enough. If it has been described in a prior printed publication anywhere in the world, it is not patentable. Moreover, merely being different is not enough—it has to be an unobvious improvement over what is known to the public.

3. Having a patent stops others from copying or imitating my product.
Wrong. Patents are not self-enforcing. You have to identify and pursue copiers, and a patent infringement lawsuit takes years and costs hundreds of thousands of dollars, win or lose.

4. Getting a patent is something I can do quickly, at low cost.
Wrong. The U.S. Supreme Court has characterized a patent as one of the most difficult documents to write. Getting a patent is a highly specialized undertaking that requires the services of a patent attorney or agent. And, it takes a couple of years, and costs thousands of dollars, even if no complications are encountered.

5. Having a patent is needed to be able to sell my product.
Wrong. Most products on the market are not and never were patented, and in most cases any applicable patents have expired.

6. Having a patent will assure the success of my product.
Wrong. Fewer than one patented product in a hundred ever makes it to the marketplace.

7. Having a patent will assure that I will be able to sell my idea or license it to a big company.
Wrong. Big companies have many specialists developing new products, and the likelihood that a private inventor without that expertise might come up with something they haven’t thought of is unusual. Besides, your product would have to be a good fit for all three major company divisions—manufacturing, engineering, and sales/marketing—before a big company would have any interest.

8. I can get a non-disclosure agreement which will give me adequate protection without a patent.
Wrong. Non-disclosure agreements are not all alike, but to be enforceable they must be limited in time and scope. Typically they expire in a year or two, and they cover only specifically disclosed subject matter. Besides, for a manufacturing company, signing such an agreement in advance is like signing a blank check—you simply cannot expect that.

9. Describing my idea in a registered mail letter to myself will protect me.
Wrong. Such documents are useless. They are not even admissible in evidence in the Patent Office or in the courts.

10. So is there anything I can do, without major expense, for at least a measure of protection?
You can file a provisional application in the US Patent and Trademark Office. No search, no claims, and no special format requirements apply, so you can do it yourself provided that you make a complete enough disclosure to enable others to practice the invention by using only ordinary skill in the field to which the invention pertains. For a private inventor or small business, the only cost is a government fee of $100. For more information, visit http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/provapp.htm.

A provisional application is not a patent and can never become a patent. It does not enable you to stop others from imitating or copying. What it does is give you an official priority date in the Patent and Trademark Office for the material which it contains. And, it holds that date for up to one year, enabling you to test your invention, do market research, have a patentability search, see if you can find prospective licensees, and get other information to help you make the cost/benefit decision on whether it's worth making an $8000 to $10,000 commitment to go after a patent. Unless you file a complete application within that year, the provisional application dies and will never be opened to public access.

Having a provisional application on file enables you to mark your invention “Patent Pending,” but only while either the provisional or a follow-on complete application is alive. However “Patent Pending” does not mean that others cannot make or sell copies. It is like a “Keep Off the Grass” sign, but it has no teeth.


Copyright © John Pederson. John Pederson is a business counselor with the Tucson, AZ chapter. He also serves as an online counselor. He is a former director of patents for a major manufacturing company.

[Chris Pincetich]

Start makin the thing
On every piece of literature, label, and stamped on product "Patent Pending"
Pending patents are not searcheable, at least not back in 1998 when I got mine for NPD All-Terrain Skateboards. Get to market, be the best, and modify to beat your competition as they start to copy you. I just paid my $1k maintenance fee. NPD was super fun 1999-2005 but we lost a lot of $$$....mostly due to patent and LLC fees >>>>> profit from product. Good luck (IMG:style_emoticons/default/beerchug.gif)

[Matt Romanowski]

Applications that have been in the system for 1 year will show up.

[DBCooper]

Applications that have been in the system for 1 year will show up.

Yup. And Google's really pretty good, too, much better than the gov's.

Be careful, at the end of the day design patents don't afford much protection. Anyone can make a slight "next generation" modification and it's defeated. They can also just flat copy it and if they ignore your lawyer's cease and desist letter you'll have to decide if you want foot a huge amount of legal expenses. You might win eventually, but recovering damages for a design patent are unlikely and even then they'll just change the design slightly and carry on. Big companies beat small companies every time (I learned this working for big companies).

Why don't you go sit down with a patent attorney? You'll get better advice from him than you ever will from us... no offense, gentlemen.

[burton73]

I have a co-Inventor Bob Parker. We have worked on lots of projects together. He is 20 years older that me and taught me the patent game in the beginning when I was 22. After writing so many of these you ge a feeling and almost do not need an lawyer. It has saved us a lot of money. We write the patent together and go and over it and then just pass it to the lawyer for his approval. If it was not that my co-inventor has 74 patents we would not be so good at this. I make the drawings. This saves me huge money but is still cost me over $6.000. and takes a long time. My current one is ready to be issued and it is 5 years.


You make a lot of claims and then work with the patent office removing the ones that they will not give you. This is where you need to do your home work. If your clame claims that are two far out there they will loose interest in you filling as you have not done your home work and it goes 1,2, 3 chances and you are out. They are not there to waste there time so you need to study a lot of other people patents that will be somewhat like yours.

On a patent we have for color changing Pasta Timers I got Patent infringement insurance on the filing. This would give me $75 out of every $100 I would spend on legal fees to fight and infringement case after the patent was issued, but I had to be the first one with that idea. No one with a prototype done in there garage that can come forward and prove that they had or where working on the same idea or process before you. Looking back on it now it was a waste of money but insurance can be looked at just that it you do not need to use it.

Sometimes it is better to just run with your idea and figure how to make money. The costs to fight someone is so much more that you can imagine. If they want to play porker and have a big bank roll only the lawyers will make money.

My patents are based on color changing technology for cooking instruments.
The Duracell Battery tester is my Co-inventors. We use somthing like it in our color changing meat tester

Bob

[Katmanken]

Roger,

I am a registered patent agent and write and prosecute patents for a living. Design patents are for a shape or design, and are very easy to get around. Another type of patent that is more useful is a utility patent. In general terms, a "utility patent" protects the way an article is used and works , while a "design patent" protects the way an article looks. Methods of manufacture can also fall under utility patents.

Ken

[Dr. Roger]

Thank you Gents for sharing all of your experience.

This has really helped.

Now I know I need to complete a few things prior to filing for a design patent.


Thank you all very much.


Roger

[Heeltoe914]

Yes thanks I have been looking into ideas but needed some direction.

[byndbad914]

... and make sure it can't easily be copied period (IMG:style_emoticons/default/dry.gif) And trust me, if it will make $ someone will copy it. We (my old boss and myself) had a really slick design for a component that stengthened the bottom end of engines by tying all the mains together. The problem wasn't the patent, but what it would have cost to enforce the patent. Essentially it would have probably cost us every dime we were able to make by being first to market so we just sorta cashed in on that aspect and then like everyone else, had to whore our price and loose that great margin we had before.

Then China copied them and started selling them (we saw a drop from one of our big customers and discovered they were buying them out of China). The copied it so exact they copied the RED WHITE AND BLUE label we had and the exact part number! F$#$ing Chinese. And try to enforce that patent - it would have cost more than we were making.

Just sucks. Only thing you really have these days is first to market UNLESS the idea can make so much money you can afford legal fees to protect it (like the medical devices that cost $100K just to patent).