By articlesly
Intellectual property, although intangible, is still ownable and your intellectual property rights should be protected. Modern business, especially since the rise of the internet has seen a rise in the creation of intellectual property. However the internet makes it even easier for someone to steal your ideas and work. An intellectual property lawyer who is trained to help reclaim patent, trademark, copyright and trade secret rights can help protect your intellectual property.
Types of intellectual property include patents, trademarks and trade dress, copyright, and trade secrets.
Patents
A patent is granted by the government allowing a (typically) 20 year monopoly on an invention previously "not generally known." Patents are intended to encourage investment in research and development. If you create a new useful process for doing something, a machine, manufacture, or even an improvement on something already in existence, you can patent your invention and prohibit others from "making, using, offering for sale, or selling … or importing "the invention in the US Your right to patent your invention is a constitutional right (Article I, section 8).
Patents are subdivided into three groups: design, utility, and plant. Design patents protect innovations in the appearance (although not the structure or function) of an item. Utility patents are for wholly newventions including machines, industrial processes, compositions of matter, and articles of manufacture. Plant patents cover innovations in plant-life, such as new species of plant created from the reproduction of cuttings and grafts of existing plants.
Patent lawyers will research previously granted patents for you to see if a similar product has already been patented or whether you should apply for a patent for your invention. A patent attorney will also tell you if your idea is not patentable because it is a law of nature, a physical phenomena, or abstract. You should find a specialized patent or intellectual property attorney because in order to suspect a client's patent application, he or she must be registered with the US patent office. A patent lawyer will also have to have passed a science and engineering exam to better understand and serve clients.
Trademarks
Trademarks are granted for words, names, symbols, or devices which separate and distinguish businesses and services. These include arbitrary names such as Kodak, suggestive names such as Caterpillar (tracts), descriptive names which indicated the business' products or services, and generic names which are descriptive. Generic and some descriptive names can not be protected, so a trademark or intellectual property lawyer should be consulted to see if your name qualifies for trademark rights.
You can also file an intent-to-use application to reserve a name that will later be trademarked. (This is especially important with the expansion of business on the internet.)
Trademark lawyers can also be trusted to make sure that your new business is not using a registered mark. The consequences for using a registered mark, even though you may have put money and advertising into promoting your business, include being sued for infringement.
Copyrights
Copyrights protect the individual's expression of an idea, but do not protect the idea itself (see patent). Copyrights are intended to promote scientific progress. You can copyright your writing, performance (music, dance), art, sound, compilations. You can not copyright ideas or uncompelled facts, words, or phrases (these could be registered as trademarks, though, so consult an intellectual property lawyer). If you come up with an idea or invention while working for a company, it is able to be patented or trademarked by the company you work for, but copyrightable work belongs to you, the employee, not the company employing you. However, there are loopholes, and an intellectual property lawyer will help you both with the process of getting your expression copyrighted but will also save you trouble and time in getting over road blocks.
If you are a company, you need an intellectual property lawyer who specializes in copyright because especially with internet businesses, you will need to make sure that contractually your web site design can be copied to your company and will not belong to the employee or independent contractor who created it. This also applies to software.
Trade Secrets
It is important to protect your business' trade secrets so they will not be misappropriated. Whereas patents have a limited time of coverage and after 20 years are released, trade secrets are always protected. To qualify as a trade secret, it must have independent economic value to the company. For example, the recipe for Coca-Cola is a trade secret, not a patent, and therefore will never be released because without maintaining the secrecy of the recipe, the business would not be able to compete by offering an individual product.
Source by Margaret Wommack
Intellectual property strategies for startups
By: Benjamin Lehberger
File early, and keep quiet
Your time to file for patent protection is limited and patents should be contemplated early on in development. In the United States, an inventor has a one-year “grace period” from first publicizing an invention to filing for patent protection, after which it is too late. However, you should not wait even that long. In 2013, the U.S. patent system switched from a first-to-invent to a first-inventor-to-file system. This subtle difference in terminology could mean dire consequences for those who delay seeking patent protection.
Under the old first-to-invent system, you could be the first to conceive of an invention and still obtain patent rights over an earlier filer by showing that you conceived first and continued to diligently work on your invention. Today, it is a race to the patent office. Regardless of who conceived of the invention first, the first one to file their patent application “wins.”
While patents are a valuable asset to any startup, they are only one piece of the puzzle.
Also, it is important to note that the one-year “grace period” to file a patent application is not available in most countries outside of the United States. If you plan to seek patent protection abroad, publicizing your invention at any time before filing a patent application could put your foreign intellectual property rights in jeopardy. Therefore, file early and keep quiet until you do.
File again as the invention evolves
As your startup continues to develop its product or products, consider each new feature as a possibility for patent protection. Startups that file one early patent application and stop may find that, once the patent issues, the product has moved far beyond what was in the original patent application. The product may end up being under-protected or not even covered by the patent at all.
It is important to reevaluate patent protection on a regular basis and consider filing on new features of the invention when applicable. If the product is evolving quickly, consider filing a provisional patent application or a series of provisional patent applications within a year before filing a utility patent application.
Do not wait for your patent to issue
Patents take time. While there are avenues available to expedite examination, on average it takes more than two years for a patent to be granted by the U.S. Patent Office. About 30 percent of patent applications do not make it through at all.
Having an issued patent may help to get funding for your startup and secure your place in your market. But, do not wait until your patent issues to commercialize your invention. Keep your startup moving forward and keep developing. Chances are, you will solve additional problems along the way, which may lead to even more important inventions. In the meantime, you will be building your brand, reputation and revenue.
Consider design patents
When discussing patents, the focus is often on utility patents, but design patents should also be considered as part of a well-rounded intellectual property strategy. In general, a utility patent protects the way a product is used and works, while a design patent protects the way the product looks. By the end of 2015, the U.S. Patent Office had issued more than 9.2 million utility patents, but only about 746,000 design patents.
Design patents can provide significant value as a supplement to utility patents or as a replacement when utility patent protection is unavailable. Software utility patents are still available in the United States. But, following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Alice v. CLS Bank, obtaining utility patent protection for software-related inventions has become more difficult and less predictable. Design patents provide a viable option to protect certain features of software-related inventions, particularly the graphical user interfaces.
The term of a design patent is slightly less, 15 years from grant for a design patent versus 20 years from filing for a utility patent, but so is the cost. Also, design patents often can be obtained much quicker than utility patents.
Do not rely solely on patents
While patents are a valuable asset to any startup, they are only one piece of the puzzle. First and foremost, a startup needs a good product or service to be successful. The Patent Office awards patents for new and non-obvious inventions. Receiving a patent does not mean, however, that it is necessarily a good invention or one that anyone will want to buy. Make sure what you are protecting is worth protecting.
Second, build a unique brand and protect it with registered trademarks. A trademark is a word, phrase, symbol or design that identifies and distinguishes the source of the goods of one party from those of others. Having a strong and recognizable trademark can be extremely valuable for distinguishing you from the competition. And, unlike patents, a registered trademark never expires as long as you keep using it. Trademarks do not have strict filing deadlines like patents, but it is best to start early and have a trademark clearance search done to ensure that there are no conflicts that could prevent your use of the trademark.
Finally, depending on the type of business your startup is in, copyright and trade secret protection also should be considered in your intellectual property strategy. Talk to an intellectual property professional as you begin building your startup to discuss what types of intellectual property protection will work best for you.
File early, and keep quiet
Your time to file for patent protection is limited and patents should be contemplated early on in development. In the United States, an inventor has a one-year “grace period” from first publicizing an invention to filing for patent protection, after which it is too late. However, you should not wait even that long. In 2013, the U.S. patent system switched from a first-to-invent to a first-inventor-to-file system. This subtle difference in terminology could mean dire consequences for those who delay seeking patent protection.
Under the old first-to-invent system, you could be the first to conceive of an invention and still obtain patent rights over an earlier filer by showing that you conceived first and continued to diligently work on your invention. Today, it is a race to the patent office. Regardless of who conceived of the invention first, the first one to file their patent application “wins.”
While patents are a valuable asset to any startup, they are only one piece of the puzzle.
Also, it is important to note that the one-year “grace period” to file a patent application is not available in most countries outside of the United States. If you plan to seek patent protection abroad, publicizing your invention at any time before filing a patent application could put your foreign intellectual property rights in jeopardy. Therefore, file early and keep quiet until you do.
File again as the invention evolves
As your startup continues to develop its product or products, consider each new feature as a possibility for patent protection. Startups that file one early patent application and stop may find that, once the patent issues, the product has moved far beyond what was in the original patent application. The product may end up being under-protected or not even covered by the patent at all.
It is important to reevaluate patent protection on a regular basis and consider filing on new features of the invention when applicable. If the product is evolving quickly, consider filing a provisional patent application or a series of provisional patent applications within a year before filing a utility patent application.
Do not wait for your patent to issue
Patents take time. While there are avenues available to expedite examination, on average it takes more than two years for a patent to be granted by the U.S. Patent Office. About 30 percent of patent applications do not make it through at all.
Having an issued patent may help to get funding for your startup and secure your place in your market. But, do not wait until your patent issues to commercialize your invention. Keep your startup moving forward and keep developing. Chances are, you will solve additional problems along the way, which may lead to even more important inventions. In the meantime, you will be building your brand, reputation and revenue.
Consider design patents
When discussing patents, the focus is often on utility patents, but design patents should also be considered as part of a well-rounded intellectual property strategy. In general, a utility patent protects the way a product is used and works, while a design patent protects the way the product looks. By the end of 2015, the U.S. Patent Office had issued more than 9.2 million utility patents, but only about 746,000 design patents.
Design patents can provide significant value as a supplement to utility patents or as a replacement when utility patent protection is unavailable. Software utility patents are still available in the United States. But, following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Alice v. CLS Bank, obtaining utility patent protection for software-related inventions has become more difficult and less predictable. Design patents provide a viable option to protect certain features of software-related inventions, particularly the graphical user interfaces.
The term of a design patent is slightly less, 15 years from grant for a design patent versus 20 years from filing for a utility patent, but so is the cost. Also, design patents often can be obtained much quicker than utility patents.
Do not rely solely on patents
While patents are a valuable asset to any startup, they are only one piece of the puzzle. First and foremost, a startup needs a good product or service to be successful. The Patent Office awards patents for new and non-obvious inventions. Receiving a patent does not mean, however, that it is necessarily a good invention or one that anyone will want to buy. Make sure what you are protecting is worth protecting.
Second, build a unique brand and protect it with registered trademarks. A trademark is a word, phrase, symbol or design that identifies and distinguishes the source of the goods of one party from those of others. Having a strong and recognizable trademark can be extremely valuable for distinguishing you from the competition. And, unlike patents, a registered trademark never expires as long as you keep using it. Trademarks do not have strict filing deadlines like patents, but it is best to start early and have a trademark clearance search done to ensure that there are no conflicts that could prevent your use of the trademark.
Finally, depending on the type of business your startup is in, copyright and trade secret protection also should be considered in your intellectual property strategy. Talk to an intellectual property professional as you begin building your startup to discuss what types of intellectual property protection will work best for you.
Intellectual Property in the Age of 3D Scanning and 3D Printing
By: SAM BILLINGSLEY JR
A few weeks ago, Sean passed a couple of links my way regarding the questions surrounding the trademarking of point cloud data. He asked for my opinion and, after emerging from the rabbit hole nearly a month later, I’m still not sure exactly what my opinion is. However, I am sure that the questions brought forth are both thought-provoking and in need of consideration by anyone that works or plays in the reality capture space.
Let’s start where Sean dropped me in to this and see where it goes…
DoctorowThe post he sent me was “Why 3D Scans Aren’t Copyrightable” by Cory Doctorow. The post is basically a summation of the work of Michael Weinberg who is the General Counsel for Shapeways which is a company/community built around 3D printing and 3D design. I must admit that my first instinct was one of suspicion: Of course the attorney for a 3D printing company thinks that 3D scans are not copyrightable, it’s in his employer’s best interest! However, after taking the time to read his other papers, I do think that he is right–you can’t copyright a scan. However, getting around the rules that make him right are so easy that I’m not sure it will matter the way we think.
Let’s go a bit deeper by defining a few terms that we will need to use
1.Physible: a dataset that is capable of being manufactured as a physical object using a 3D printer or DNC machine.
2.Copyright: the exclusive legal right given to an originator or an assignee to print, publish, perform, film, or record literary, artistic, or musical material, and to authorize others to do the same.
3.Patent: a government authority or license conferring a right or title for a set period, especially the sole right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention.
4.Design Patent: a form of intellectual property protection which allows an inventor to protect the original shape or surface ornamentation of a useful manufactured article
5.Trademark: a symbol, word, or words legally registered or established by use as representing a company or product
Clearing up Confusion
One of the most confusing aspects of this to the layperson is the common misuse of the terms “Patent” and “Copyright.” To further clarify, here is a comparison chart based on Weinberger’s work:
Read More >> https://www.spar3d.com/blogs/confessions-of-a-hired-gun/intellectual-property-age-3d-scanning-physibles/
A few weeks ago, Sean passed a couple of links my way regarding the questions surrounding the trademarking of point cloud data. He asked for my opinion and, after emerging from the rabbit hole nearly a month later, I’m still not sure exactly what my opinion is. However, I am sure that the questions brought forth are both thought-provoking and in need of consideration by anyone that works or plays in the reality capture space.
Let’s start where Sean dropped me in to this and see where it goes…
DoctorowThe post he sent me was “Why 3D Scans Aren’t Copyrightable” by Cory Doctorow. The post is basically a summation of the work of Michael Weinberg who is the General Counsel for Shapeways which is a company/community built around 3D printing and 3D design. I must admit that my first instinct was one of suspicion: Of course the attorney for a 3D printing company thinks that 3D scans are not copyrightable, it’s in his employer’s best interest! However, after taking the time to read his other papers, I do think that he is right–you can’t copyright a scan. However, getting around the rules that make him right are so easy that I’m not sure it will matter the way we think.
Let’s go a bit deeper by defining a few terms that we will need to use
1.Physible: a dataset that is capable of being manufactured as a physical object using a 3D printer or DNC machine.
2.Copyright: the exclusive legal right given to an originator or an assignee to print, publish, perform, film, or record literary, artistic, or musical material, and to authorize others to do the same.
3.Patent: a government authority or license conferring a right or title for a set period, especially the sole right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention.
4.Design Patent: a form of intellectual property protection which allows an inventor to protect the original shape or surface ornamentation of a useful manufactured article
5.Trademark: a symbol, word, or words legally registered or established by use as representing a company or product
Clearing up Confusion
One of the most confusing aspects of this to the layperson is the common misuse of the terms “Patent” and “Copyright.” To further clarify, here is a comparison chart based on Weinberger’s work:
Read More >> https://www.spar3d.com/blogs/confessions-of-a-hired-gun/intellectual-property-age-3d-scanning-physibles/
What is Intellectual Property?
By Gene Quinn
Generally speaking, “intellectual property” is probably best thought of (at least form a conceptual standpoint) as creations of the mind that are given the legal rights often associated with real or personal property. The rights that are obtained by the creator are a function of statutory law (i.e., law created by the legislature). These statutes may be federal or state laws, or in some instance both federal and state law govern various aspect of a single type of intellectual property.
The term intellectual property itself is now commonly used to refer to the bundle of rights conferred by each of the following fields of law: (1) patent law; (2) copyright law; (3) trade secret law; (4) the right of publicity; and (5) trademark and unfair competition law. Some people confuse these areas of intellectual property law, and although there may be some similarities among these kinds of intellectual property protection, they are different and serve different purposes.
What is a Patent?
Whenever you think patent you should think invention. Thus, a patent is the grant of a property right to an inventor. Patents only exist once they have been granted, and in the United States patents are issued by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, which is a non-commercial federal entity and one of 14 bureaus in the Department of Commerce. Before going any further it is worth pointing out that ideas are not patentable, although every invention starts out with an idea. Still, in order to be in a position where you can obtain a patent your idea must have matured into an invention. See Moving from Idea to Patent.
There are three very different kinds of patent in the United States: (1) a utility patent, which covers the functional aspects of products and processes; (2) a design patent, which covers the ornamental design of useful objects; and (3) a plant patent, which covers a new variety of living plant.
Each type of patent confers “the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, or selling” the invention in the United States or “importing” the invention into the United States. It is important to note, however, that patents do not protect ideas, but rather protect only tangible or identifiable structures and methods.
Typically when someone refers generically to “a patent” they are talking about a utility patent. In order to obtain a utility patent it is necessary to file a non-provisional patent application and go through an examination process where a patent examiner will review the application to determine what, if any, claims can be allowed. Many are probably also familiar with a provisional patent application, which can be used to establish priority and give the applicant “patent pending” status. A provisional patent application will never mature into a patent though. It is always necessary to file a non provisional patent application to obtain a patent.
Patent claims define the exclusive rights granted by the government. If it is not in a patent claim you do not have rights associated with it. If the claims are too detailed they can be easy to get around and not commercially useful. There is a lot that goes into any patent application, both from a technical and strategic standpoint.
Generally speaking the patent term for utility patents is now 20 years from the date on which the application for the patent was filed in the United States. Under some circumstances it is possible to obtain a 5 year extension to the patent grant, but this is rare, unless your invention relates to a pharmaceutical composition. It is also possible to obtain extension of patent term due to USPTO delay. Design patents, unlike utility patents, have a 14 year term from date of issuance. Historically, design patents were quite weak, but as the result of an important decision from the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in the Fall of 2008, design patents are now much stronger and should be considered an important part of a patent portfolio when your invention relates to a product.
Read More >> http://www.ipwatchdog.com/2014/07/19/what-is-intellectual-property/id=47109/
Generally speaking, “intellectual property” is probably best thought of (at least form a conceptual standpoint) as creations of the mind that are given the legal rights often associated with real or personal property. The rights that are obtained by the creator are a function of statutory law (i.e., law created by the legislature). These statutes may be federal or state laws, or in some instance both federal and state law govern various aspect of a single type of intellectual property.
The term intellectual property itself is now commonly used to refer to the bundle of rights conferred by each of the following fields of law: (1) patent law; (2) copyright law; (3) trade secret law; (4) the right of publicity; and (5) trademark and unfair competition law. Some people confuse these areas of intellectual property law, and although there may be some similarities among these kinds of intellectual property protection, they are different and serve different purposes.
What is a Patent?
Whenever you think patent you should think invention. Thus, a patent is the grant of a property right to an inventor. Patents only exist once they have been granted, and in the United States patents are issued by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, which is a non-commercial federal entity and one of 14 bureaus in the Department of Commerce. Before going any further it is worth pointing out that ideas are not patentable, although every invention starts out with an idea. Still, in order to be in a position where you can obtain a patent your idea must have matured into an invention. See Moving from Idea to Patent.
There are three very different kinds of patent in the United States: (1) a utility patent, which covers the functional aspects of products and processes; (2) a design patent, which covers the ornamental design of useful objects; and (3) a plant patent, which covers a new variety of living plant.
Each type of patent confers “the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, or selling” the invention in the United States or “importing” the invention into the United States. It is important to note, however, that patents do not protect ideas, but rather protect only tangible or identifiable structures and methods.
Typically when someone refers generically to “a patent” they are talking about a utility patent. In order to obtain a utility patent it is necessary to file a non-provisional patent application and go through an examination process where a patent examiner will review the application to determine what, if any, claims can be allowed. Many are probably also familiar with a provisional patent application, which can be used to establish priority and give the applicant “patent pending” status. A provisional patent application will never mature into a patent though. It is always necessary to file a non provisional patent application to obtain a patent.
Patent claims define the exclusive rights granted by the government. If it is not in a patent claim you do not have rights associated with it. If the claims are too detailed they can be easy to get around and not commercially useful. There is a lot that goes into any patent application, both from a technical and strategic standpoint.
Generally speaking the patent term for utility patents is now 20 years from the date on which the application for the patent was filed in the United States. Under some circumstances it is possible to obtain a 5 year extension to the patent grant, but this is rare, unless your invention relates to a pharmaceutical composition. It is also possible to obtain extension of patent term due to USPTO delay. Design patents, unlike utility patents, have a 14 year term from date of issuance. Historically, design patents were quite weak, but as the result of an important decision from the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in the Fall of 2008, design patents are now much stronger and should be considered an important part of a patent portfolio when your invention relates to a product.
Read More >> http://www.ipwatchdog.com/2014/07/19/what-is-intellectual-property/id=47109/
Intellectual Property Punch List for Startups
By: RENT C.J. BRITTON, MANAGING PARTNER, DE LA PEÑA & HOLIDAY, LLP
When you create, design, or invent things, the rules of intellectual property (IP) determine who owns your creations, whether or not you can prevent other people from copying them, and whether or not you yourself can use them freely. If you are starting a company, you should know enough about IP to make intelligent decisions about your business to add value and reduce risk.
IP law is esoteric, arcane, and often counterintuitive. Normal business assumptions do not always apply, and can prove to be dangerous. Aggressive, thoughtful management of your IP portfolio is a sound business practice, and you should start as early as possible.
You don’t have to know a ton about the theoretical philosophy or legal underpinnings of IP in order to use it effectively. As you begin your entrepreneurial saga, be sure to pay attention to the following IP issues:
Clear trademark rights before naming things
You cannot use a brand in commerce if your use would be confusingly similar to someone else’s brand. So, do not name your company or your product or service without clearing trademark rights first. Once you choose your name, scour the internet using the search engine of your choice to ensure no one else is using it as the brand name of similar goods or services. Also check the TESS trademark database at uspto.gov to see if your name turns up. Remember that trademarks are compared on the basis of their overall visual and phonetic impression, so clever spelling inconsistencies–substituting a Z for an S, for example–should be ignored in this process.
If you cannot find your name in use anywhere else as the brand of similar products, go ahead just in case and have a formal trademark search conducted by a competent trademark lawyer. They can tell you whether you will be able to get a trademark on your brand and, perhaps more importantly, whether someone else is going to sue you if you start using it.
Then, and only then, is it safe to start naming your company and branding your products with the name that passes through the above clearance process. Remember, trademark rights are obtained neither by forming your corporation or LLC at the secretary of state’s office, nor by registering a domain name. Those ministerial items, while important, do not matter to the trademark process and should happen only after trademark rights are clear.
Everyone signs the agreement
Have your lawyer prepare a short noncompetition, nondisclosure, and IP ownership agreement to be signed by every co-founder, employee, independent contractor, and anyone else in the company who is contributing to the conception or development of creative and innovative assets. The agreement should ensure that: (i) everything they create is owned by the company; (ii) they are bound to keep all company information confidential; and (iii) they will not compete with the company while they are working for it (and, depending on your state, for some time thereafter).
Pre-audit your IP portfolio
Investors and acquiring companies really like IP, because of the exclusionary path to market it can afford. When you are being examined by a potential investor or acquirer (in a process known as “due diligence”), they will want to know the following:
1.Do you own your IP?
2.Is your IP portfolio complete? Are you protecting everything that is capable of being protected?
3.Is your IP strong and enforceable? If you sue someone for infringing it, will you win?
Why not be prepared for the due diligence examination ahead of time? Identify the creative and innovative assets in your company for which the answer to any of the above questions is “no,” and take remedial steps for changing the “no” to a “yes.” Then put appropriate processes and procedures in place for ensuring that the answers will henceforth always be “yes.”
Correcting IP title defects requires getting the proper ownership agreements signed between the company and the people who created the IP assets. If any creative contributor did not sign the IP agreement described above, make that happen as soon as possible.
Correcting completeness defects is simply a matter of filing for whatever patents, copyrights, and trademarks are missing in the portfolio, and instituting internal disclosure and management procedures for identifying and assessing new innovations on a constant basis so that new IP doesn’t slip through the corporate cracks in the future. Basically, every novel and nonobvious invention should be patented, every brand should be trademarked, every important piece of content should be copyrighted, and every vital secret should be protected.
Finally, correcting strength & enforceability defects requires a measure of strategic attention to ensure the company’s innovations are being protected in the strongest possible ways in light of the competitive landscape in which they exist. For some innovations, a slew of patents will be the answer; other innovations will best be kept confidential in reliance on trade secret law; for yet others, a mix of patents and trade secrets, as well as copyrights and trademarks, will provide the most bang for your buck.
Make sure NDAs don’t expire or terminate
If you own valuable information that your competitors don’t know and that gives you an advantage over them in some way – perhaps your secret formula or manufacturing technique or algorithm -- congratulations, you probably have a protectable trade secret. If you have occasion to divulge your trade secrets to an outsider, you must have that person sign a nondisclosure agreement (NDA) to maintain the secrecy of your secret. If you reveal the secret to someone who is not bound by an NDA, it is no longer protectable as a trade secret. Here’s the thing: trade secrets can last forever as long as you keep them secret. So read your NDA carefully to ensure that the obligations of secrecy do not terminate after some period of years. The person signing your NDA should be bound to keep your secrets secret for as long as they are protectable as trade secrets!
To make this process more painless, all Gust Launch founders get access to workflows to easily create one-way and two-way NDA agreements.
Patents are your friend
Patent trolls have given patents a bad name. If you create, own, or deal in technological or scientific inventions, software, certain designs, and certain other inventive creations that advance the state of the art, you need to consider filing lots of patents. Patents protect inventions, some designs, gene sequences, business methods, some plants, and software. Patents are obtained by inventing the invention and by applying for and being awarded a patent. Registration is mandatory. Patents in useful inventions last for 20 years, and 14 years for designs, from the date the application is filed, in the U.S.
In the U.S., inventors can file a document known as a provisional patent, sometimes referred to as a provisional patent application. In truth, both names are misleading because a provisional patent is neither a patent nor an application for a patent. Strictly speaking, a provisional patent is merely a document that is filed with the USPTO in which the inventor describes an invention. That’s it. This document is never examined or reviewed by the USPTO; it is merely placed on file for a year in anticipation of the filing of a follow-on nonprovisional patent application that is based on it. If, during the year after a provisional patent is filed, the inventor files a nonprovisional patent application on the invention disclosed in the earlier provisional patent that enables the same invention, the nonprovisional patent application will obtain the original filing date – called the priority date – of the provisional patent.
Nonprovisional patent applications generally cost around $10,000 for patent counsel to prepare and file. Provisional patents, however, can be much less expensive. If prepared by counsel, a thorough provisional patent can run from $3000 to $4000. But because provisional patents are never examined, they can be much less rigorously prepared than nonprovisional applications; as the inventor, you are often in a great position to draft your own provisional application asking counsel only to review before filing. This can reduce your fees to perhaps $500 or less.
Because a provisional patent can be prepared quickly and inexpensively, filing a provisional patent is useful when a company wishes to begin to obtain a measure of patent protection without committing to the expense of time and money required to prepare and file a nonprovisional patent application. After a provisional patent is filed, for example, the inventor can use the phrase “patent pending” when publicly referring to the invention disclosed in the provisional patent. This notice that a patent application is in the works can sometimes forestall others from copying the invention.
As a general rule, anyone doing a lot of inventing should be filing a lot of provisional patents. You can even include more than one invention in the same provisional while paying a single filing fee at the USPTO.
While these applications and processes may sound somewhat onerous and a little expensive, having to protect your inventions (and being allowed to protect them) is really a good sign—it means that you are developing the technologies that will give you an advantage over your competitors, and being recognized as their inventor. If you are starting a technology company, or any company really, IP must become a part of the things to which you pay attention to maximize your company’s value and reduce its risks.
When you create, design, or invent things, the rules of intellectual property (IP) determine who owns your creations, whether or not you can prevent other people from copying them, and whether or not you yourself can use them freely. If you are starting a company, you should know enough about IP to make intelligent decisions about your business to add value and reduce risk.
IP law is esoteric, arcane, and often counterintuitive. Normal business assumptions do not always apply, and can prove to be dangerous. Aggressive, thoughtful management of your IP portfolio is a sound business practice, and you should start as early as possible.
You don’t have to know a ton about the theoretical philosophy or legal underpinnings of IP in order to use it effectively. As you begin your entrepreneurial saga, be sure to pay attention to the following IP issues:
Clear trademark rights before naming things
You cannot use a brand in commerce if your use would be confusingly similar to someone else’s brand. So, do not name your company or your product or service without clearing trademark rights first. Once you choose your name, scour the internet using the search engine of your choice to ensure no one else is using it as the brand name of similar goods or services. Also check the TESS trademark database at uspto.gov to see if your name turns up. Remember that trademarks are compared on the basis of their overall visual and phonetic impression, so clever spelling inconsistencies–substituting a Z for an S, for example–should be ignored in this process.
If you cannot find your name in use anywhere else as the brand of similar products, go ahead just in case and have a formal trademark search conducted by a competent trademark lawyer. They can tell you whether you will be able to get a trademark on your brand and, perhaps more importantly, whether someone else is going to sue you if you start using it.
Then, and only then, is it safe to start naming your company and branding your products with the name that passes through the above clearance process. Remember, trademark rights are obtained neither by forming your corporation or LLC at the secretary of state’s office, nor by registering a domain name. Those ministerial items, while important, do not matter to the trademark process and should happen only after trademark rights are clear.
Everyone signs the agreement
Have your lawyer prepare a short noncompetition, nondisclosure, and IP ownership agreement to be signed by every co-founder, employee, independent contractor, and anyone else in the company who is contributing to the conception or development of creative and innovative assets. The agreement should ensure that: (i) everything they create is owned by the company; (ii) they are bound to keep all company information confidential; and (iii) they will not compete with the company while they are working for it (and, depending on your state, for some time thereafter).
Pre-audit your IP portfolio
Investors and acquiring companies really like IP, because of the exclusionary path to market it can afford. When you are being examined by a potential investor or acquirer (in a process known as “due diligence”), they will want to know the following:
1.Do you own your IP?
2.Is your IP portfolio complete? Are you protecting everything that is capable of being protected?
3.Is your IP strong and enforceable? If you sue someone for infringing it, will you win?
Why not be prepared for the due diligence examination ahead of time? Identify the creative and innovative assets in your company for which the answer to any of the above questions is “no,” and take remedial steps for changing the “no” to a “yes.” Then put appropriate processes and procedures in place for ensuring that the answers will henceforth always be “yes.”
Correcting IP title defects requires getting the proper ownership agreements signed between the company and the people who created the IP assets. If any creative contributor did not sign the IP agreement described above, make that happen as soon as possible.
Correcting completeness defects is simply a matter of filing for whatever patents, copyrights, and trademarks are missing in the portfolio, and instituting internal disclosure and management procedures for identifying and assessing new innovations on a constant basis so that new IP doesn’t slip through the corporate cracks in the future. Basically, every novel and nonobvious invention should be patented, every brand should be trademarked, every important piece of content should be copyrighted, and every vital secret should be protected.
Finally, correcting strength & enforceability defects requires a measure of strategic attention to ensure the company’s innovations are being protected in the strongest possible ways in light of the competitive landscape in which they exist. For some innovations, a slew of patents will be the answer; other innovations will best be kept confidential in reliance on trade secret law; for yet others, a mix of patents and trade secrets, as well as copyrights and trademarks, will provide the most bang for your buck.
Make sure NDAs don’t expire or terminate
If you own valuable information that your competitors don’t know and that gives you an advantage over them in some way – perhaps your secret formula or manufacturing technique or algorithm -- congratulations, you probably have a protectable trade secret. If you have occasion to divulge your trade secrets to an outsider, you must have that person sign a nondisclosure agreement (NDA) to maintain the secrecy of your secret. If you reveal the secret to someone who is not bound by an NDA, it is no longer protectable as a trade secret. Here’s the thing: trade secrets can last forever as long as you keep them secret. So read your NDA carefully to ensure that the obligations of secrecy do not terminate after some period of years. The person signing your NDA should be bound to keep your secrets secret for as long as they are protectable as trade secrets!
To make this process more painless, all Gust Launch founders get access to workflows to easily create one-way and two-way NDA agreements.
Patents are your friend
Patent trolls have given patents a bad name. If you create, own, or deal in technological or scientific inventions, software, certain designs, and certain other inventive creations that advance the state of the art, you need to consider filing lots of patents. Patents protect inventions, some designs, gene sequences, business methods, some plants, and software. Patents are obtained by inventing the invention and by applying for and being awarded a patent. Registration is mandatory. Patents in useful inventions last for 20 years, and 14 years for designs, from the date the application is filed, in the U.S.
In the U.S., inventors can file a document known as a provisional patent, sometimes referred to as a provisional patent application. In truth, both names are misleading because a provisional patent is neither a patent nor an application for a patent. Strictly speaking, a provisional patent is merely a document that is filed with the USPTO in which the inventor describes an invention. That’s it. This document is never examined or reviewed by the USPTO; it is merely placed on file for a year in anticipation of the filing of a follow-on nonprovisional patent application that is based on it. If, during the year after a provisional patent is filed, the inventor files a nonprovisional patent application on the invention disclosed in the earlier provisional patent that enables the same invention, the nonprovisional patent application will obtain the original filing date – called the priority date – of the provisional patent.
Nonprovisional patent applications generally cost around $10,000 for patent counsel to prepare and file. Provisional patents, however, can be much less expensive. If prepared by counsel, a thorough provisional patent can run from $3000 to $4000. But because provisional patents are never examined, they can be much less rigorously prepared than nonprovisional applications; as the inventor, you are often in a great position to draft your own provisional application asking counsel only to review before filing. This can reduce your fees to perhaps $500 or less.
Because a provisional patent can be prepared quickly and inexpensively, filing a provisional patent is useful when a company wishes to begin to obtain a measure of patent protection without committing to the expense of time and money required to prepare and file a nonprovisional patent application. After a provisional patent is filed, for example, the inventor can use the phrase “patent pending” when publicly referring to the invention disclosed in the provisional patent. This notice that a patent application is in the works can sometimes forestall others from copying the invention.
As a general rule, anyone doing a lot of inventing should be filing a lot of provisional patents. You can even include more than one invention in the same provisional while paying a single filing fee at the USPTO.
While these applications and processes may sound somewhat onerous and a little expensive, having to protect your inventions (and being allowed to protect them) is really a good sign—it means that you are developing the technologies that will give you an advantage over your competitors, and being recognized as their inventor. If you are starting a technology company, or any company really, IP must become a part of the things to which you pay attention to maximize your company’s value and reduce its risks.
When, why and how to launch your startup in secret
By James McGrath
When you’re building your startup, the first step is to tell everybody about it, right?
While there are thousands of startups out there trying to get the attention of the press and prospective customers, there are those that deliberately avoid the limelight.
Businesses like Domo and Rev have gone the unusual route of making people sign non-disclosure agreements before letting prospective customers and funders have a play around with their products.
It’s unusual for a company to launch in complete stealth mode, and with an interconnected ecosystem it’s kind of hard to do things in complete silence these days. So why would you want to keep your startup under wraps?
The main benefits
The benefits of launching in stealth mode can be broadly sorted into three categories:
1.It gives you the focus to work on version 1.0 of your product without distraction
2.It helps build an air of mystique around your company, especially if the founders are well known
3.It keeps IP and the industry problem you’re targeting away from the prying eyes of potential competitors
4.It basically allows you the time and space to work on your product with a select group of potential clients and collaborators to keep the feedback loop really tight.
It also allows you to launch with a fully realised product which surprises and delights rather than doesn’t meet the expectations of hype.
Of course, this approach has its down side…
READ: What is a startup, seriously?
The drawbacks
Then again, trying to keep a lid on things could present these three problems:
1.You can’t build early brand momentum if you don’t tell anybody about it
2.It limits the number of investors, potential customers and other parties who can provide valuable feedback on early builds
3.People may see your insistence that people sign non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) as a sign of unearned paranoia
In a world where there are thousands of startups vying for attention, keeping silent about yours can seem like cutting off your nose to spite your face.
But some startups swear by the benefits of launching in secret — so what’s the best way to do it?
The tools you’ll need
Some startups that choose to launch in secret do so because they’re afraid of someone stealing their idea — which isn’t always unfounded.
But IP lawyer (and Pulse contributor) Blake Knowles told The Pulse that the simplest way to avert this fear is to file a patent, which if granted, gives you exclusivity in the market you filed the patent in.
Of course, that could potentially tip off a rival if they’re savvy enough to be looking at patent applications in their area.
Meanwhile, a standard NDA could prohibit third parties talking about your idea to help protect it — but again, it’s quite limiting.
“From an IP protection perspective, any activity that exposes your product is generally incompatible with protection of the IP in the product itself, unless a patent application has been filed, or disclosures are carefully made subject to confidentiality agreements,” said Knowles.
“However, NDAs can limit the momentum of the product, and not all products or services are patentable. Spending money on patent filings needs to be strategic.
“Unfortunately, there are no other real ‘tools’ available to entrepreneurs to protect rights in the product itself, if they want to start generating interest in the market.”
READ: 5 IP shortcuts for small businesses
And that’s the rub — you can use NDAs to keep your new product or service under wraps, but it could be more difficult to build early momentum for your product.
Similarly, spending money on patent filings might limit your spend in other areas such as marketing.
Most startups don’t have the luxury of being able to build their product or service in the dark — they need to start making noise as soon as possible.
But for a few, launching in stealth mode may be the way to go.
When you’re building your startup, the first step is to tell everybody about it, right?
While there are thousands of startups out there trying to get the attention of the press and prospective customers, there are those that deliberately avoid the limelight.
Businesses like Domo and Rev have gone the unusual route of making people sign non-disclosure agreements before letting prospective customers and funders have a play around with their products.
It’s unusual for a company to launch in complete stealth mode, and with an interconnected ecosystem it’s kind of hard to do things in complete silence these days. So why would you want to keep your startup under wraps?
The main benefits
The benefits of launching in stealth mode can be broadly sorted into three categories:
1.It gives you the focus to work on version 1.0 of your product without distraction
2.It helps build an air of mystique around your company, especially if the founders are well known
3.It keeps IP and the industry problem you’re targeting away from the prying eyes of potential competitors
4.It basically allows you the time and space to work on your product with a select group of potential clients and collaborators to keep the feedback loop really tight.
It also allows you to launch with a fully realised product which surprises and delights rather than doesn’t meet the expectations of hype.
Of course, this approach has its down side…
READ: What is a startup, seriously?
The drawbacks
Then again, trying to keep a lid on things could present these three problems:
1.You can’t build early brand momentum if you don’t tell anybody about it
2.It limits the number of investors, potential customers and other parties who can provide valuable feedback on early builds
3.People may see your insistence that people sign non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) as a sign of unearned paranoia
In a world where there are thousands of startups vying for attention, keeping silent about yours can seem like cutting off your nose to spite your face.
But some startups swear by the benefits of launching in secret — so what’s the best way to do it?
The tools you’ll need
Some startups that choose to launch in secret do so because they’re afraid of someone stealing their idea — which isn’t always unfounded.
But IP lawyer (and Pulse contributor) Blake Knowles told The Pulse that the simplest way to avert this fear is to file a patent, which if granted, gives you exclusivity in the market you filed the patent in.
Of course, that could potentially tip off a rival if they’re savvy enough to be looking at patent applications in their area.
Meanwhile, a standard NDA could prohibit third parties talking about your idea to help protect it — but again, it’s quite limiting.
“From an IP protection perspective, any activity that exposes your product is generally incompatible with protection of the IP in the product itself, unless a patent application has been filed, or disclosures are carefully made subject to confidentiality agreements,” said Knowles.
“However, NDAs can limit the momentum of the product, and not all products or services are patentable. Spending money on patent filings needs to be strategic.
“Unfortunately, there are no other real ‘tools’ available to entrepreneurs to protect rights in the product itself, if they want to start generating interest in the market.”
READ: 5 IP shortcuts for small businesses
And that’s the rub — you can use NDAs to keep your new product or service under wraps, but it could be more difficult to build early momentum for your product.
Similarly, spending money on patent filings might limit your spend in other areas such as marketing.
Most startups don’t have the luxury of being able to build their product or service in the dark — they need to start making noise as soon as possible.
But for a few, launching in stealth mode may be the way to go.
Intellectual Property (IP) and Know-how: Defined
By Taffy Williams
This blog will eventually discuss several key issues relating to your technology, including: selection, acquisition of rights, due diligence, commercial market, time to market, end users, size of market, and much more. The discussion of IP is sufficiently important to the NewCo that it will take more than one article to get the basics down. As such I want to discuss Intellectual Property (IP), Copyrights, Trademarks, and Know-how by first defining what it means to NewCo. Most important will be the IP with a brief description of the others. Wikipedia defines these terms as follows:
Intellectual property (IP) is a term referring to a number of distinct types of creations of the mind for which a set of exclusive rights are recognized—and the corresponding fields of law. Under intellectual property law, owners are granted certain exclusive rights to a variety of intangible assets, such as musical, literary, and artistic works; discoveries and inventions; and words, phrases, symbols, and designs. Common types of intellectual property include copyrights, trademarks, patents, industrial design rights and trade secrets in some jurisdictions. Although many of the legal principles governing intellectual property have evolved over centuries, it was not until the 19th century that the term intellectual property began to be used, and not until the late 20th century that it became commonplace in the United States. The British Statute of Anne 1710 and the Statute of Monopolies 1623 are now seen as the origins of copyright and patent law respectively.
Know-how (or knowhow as it is sometimes written) is practical knowledge of how to get something done, as opposed to “know-what” (facts), “know-why” (science), or “know-who” (networking). Know-how is often tacit knowledge, which means that it is difficult to transfer to another person by means of writing it down or verbalizing it. The opposite of tacit knowledge is explicit knowledge. In the context of industrial property (now generally viewed as intellectual property (IP)), know-how is a component in the transfer of technology in national and international environments, co-existing with or separate from other IP rights such as patents, trademarks and copyright and is an economic asset.
Copyright is a set of exclusive rights granted to the author or creator of an original work, including the right to copy, distribute and adapt the work. Copyright does not protect ideas, only their expression. In most jurisdictions copyright arises upon fixation and does not need to be registered. Copyright owners have the exclusive statutory right to exercise control over copying and other exploitation of the works for a specific period of time, after which the work is said to enter the public domain. Uses covered under limitations and exceptions to copyright, such as fair use, do not require permission from the copyright owner. All other uses require permission. Copyright owners can license or permanently transfer or assign their exclusive rights to others. Initially copyright law only applied to the copying of books. Over time other uses such as translations and derivative works were made subject to copyright. Copyright now covers a wide range of works, including maps, sheet music, dramatic works, paintings, photographs, sound recordings, motion pictures and computer programs.
A Trademark or Trade Mark or Trade-Mark is a distinctive sign or indicator used by an individual, business organization, or other legal entity to identify that the products or services to consumers with which the trademark appears originate from a unique source, and to distinguish its products or services from those of other entities. A trademark is typically a name, word, phrase, logo, symbol, design, image, or a combination of these elements. There is also a range of non-conventional trademarks comprising marks which do not fall into these standard categories, such as those based on color, smell, or sound. The owner of a registered trademark may commence legal proceedings for trademark infringement to prevent unauthorized use of that trademark. However, registration is not required. The owner of a common law trademark may also file suit, but an unregistered mark may be protectable only within the geographical area within which it has been used or in geographical areas into which it may be reasonably expected to expand. The term trademark is also used informally to refer to any distinguishing attribute by which an individual is readily identified, such as the well-known characteristics of celebrities. When a trademark is used in relation to services rather than products, it may sometimes be called a service mark, particularly in the United States.
A trademark may be designated by the following symbols:
™ (for an unregistered trade mark, that is, a mark used to promote or brand goods)
℠ (for an unregistered service mark, that is, a mark used to promote or brand services)
® (for a registered trademark)
Trademarks and Copyrights can be important forms of protection of products or symbols used to recognize a product. There may be approaches to protecting aspects of computer programs. But the real bread winners are the IP and Know-how. IP and Know-how are essential to the success of the company as they are what make NewCo special and provide a moat around the business. As far as Know-how, it will be a secret as long as you can keep the information secret. Know-how is the special sauce that goes into your company. It is something only NewCo knows and now public information is available that a competitor can use to reproduce your special sauce. For example, try to find out how to make a Coke. This info has been closely guarded for nearly 100 years.
The rights associated with the patent portion of the IP help identify markets and potential value. The IP helps keep the competition away for some period of time and provides you a legal monopoly for as much as 20 years. A patent will define claims which you can use to take an infringer to court and attempt to stop them from making a product you own the rights to.
What is a patent? Think of a patent as a deed to property, like the deed to your home. You actually have ownership and rights to keep others out of your home. You can sell the home, rent it, or just allow the home to just set and do nothing. It is your home to do with as you please; within the limits of the law. Patents are similar. Once the patent issues, it defines the technology or products you have invented and have rights of ownership. You can develop the technology, license it, sell it, and you have the unique ability to prevent anyone from selling something that is covered by your patent.
Sometimes when I discuss NewCos with entrepreneurs there is confusion about what a patent does and does not mean to the company. As just stated, a patent DOES allow you to prevent someone from selling your product. A patent DOES NOT automatically give the rights needed to sell a product. When preparing a patent, it is a like blowing a bubble in a rose bush. You want to blow the bubble as large as you can to fill the empty spaces, but if you blow it too large it will burst. The first patent issued in completely new field will make every effort to cover as much of the field as possible. As other inventors file for their new inventions in the field, they will attempt to cover uses, areas, and products not contemplated in the original patent or other issued patents in the field.
Sometimes companies refer to the original patent as an UMBRELLA PATENT because of its very nature of trying to cover the whole field of a technology area and because it provides very broad coverage. Assume, you invented and a patented table salt. Your new patented invention now has a full term before expiration which is like the umbrella covering as much of the space as possible. As the first patent in the field you attempted to cover the composition (make-up or chemical structure) of salt and therefore have a patent covering Composition of Matter; i.e. chemical makeup. Uses of the chemical which are claimed in the patent cover making food taste better and preserving food. Later, one of your competitors discovered the chemical can be used to make a great toothpaste additive and they file a patent for a particular use as toothpaste. The original inventor never contemplated this use and it was not described in the first original patent. Also, the use was not something that a person with knowledge of field would consider as obvious. The patent examiner approved and allowed issuance of a Field of Use patent for salt as an additive to a toothpaste. The owner of the composition of matter patent would not be able to practice the invention of use as toothpaste without first obtaining the rights from the inventor of the toothpaste, and the inventor of the toothpaste would not be able to sell the product without obtaining rights from the composition of matter patent. This may sound a bit complicated and it can be very complicated when dealing with technology inventions in areas that have been around a while. Essentially, these patents Block or Prevent the other inventor from particular uses or applications and each would need to obtain the rights of the other to commercialize the product.
The patent landscape around a product is of such a significant importance, that many BigCos and potential investors will ask the NewCos if they have obtained a Non-infringement Opinion Letter or a Freedom-to-Practice or Freedom-to-Operate Opinion from their legal counsel. Most often the response to BigCo is No we do not have the financial resources to do that now. While these are extremely important documents that help provide confidence that you can make and sell the products from your invention, these legal opinions are extremely expensive and most NewCos cannot afford them. As an example, in a company where I was facing potential litigation with a competitor, it cost $100K to get a Non-infringement Opinion Letter and I received a quote of $500K for a Freedom to Operate Opinion. We paid the $100K but could not afford the more comprehensive opinion letter. When first starting out, most companies could not even pay the $100K and would rather spend the funds to advance the technology. This does not mean the letters are not important, but if you cannot afford them you must try to gather as much information as possible to help address the questions from a potential investor.
To sum up, I want to make several important points:
· Having a patent gives the right to prevent others from selling a product,
· Having a patent may NOT give all of the rights needed to sell a product
· A patent review of all fields related to your product is needed to identify any blocking IP for your product
· You will need to acquire rights to any blocking IP and those rights will cost something (a topic
to discuss later)
· You need to have a good patent counsel to help with ALL of your IP issues
As always, I hope you are following along in the series and will feel free to email me with your questions. The topic of IP is essential to grasp before going further. This topic will be broken down to small segments. I am not attempting to provide any legal advice nor am I the person to do so. But, you do need to understand the basics to help direct your next steps in creating a company and talking with your legal counsel. Once the section on IP is completed, we can discuss technology and obtaining IP right.
This blog will eventually discuss several key issues relating to your technology, including: selection, acquisition of rights, due diligence, commercial market, time to market, end users, size of market, and much more. The discussion of IP is sufficiently important to the NewCo that it will take more than one article to get the basics down. As such I want to discuss Intellectual Property (IP), Copyrights, Trademarks, and Know-how by first defining what it means to NewCo. Most important will be the IP with a brief description of the others. Wikipedia defines these terms as follows:
Intellectual property (IP) is a term referring to a number of distinct types of creations of the mind for which a set of exclusive rights are recognized—and the corresponding fields of law. Under intellectual property law, owners are granted certain exclusive rights to a variety of intangible assets, such as musical, literary, and artistic works; discoveries and inventions; and words, phrases, symbols, and designs. Common types of intellectual property include copyrights, trademarks, patents, industrial design rights and trade secrets in some jurisdictions. Although many of the legal principles governing intellectual property have evolved over centuries, it was not until the 19th century that the term intellectual property began to be used, and not until the late 20th century that it became commonplace in the United States. The British Statute of Anne 1710 and the Statute of Monopolies 1623 are now seen as the origins of copyright and patent law respectively.
Know-how (or knowhow as it is sometimes written) is practical knowledge of how to get something done, as opposed to “know-what” (facts), “know-why” (science), or “know-who” (networking). Know-how is often tacit knowledge, which means that it is difficult to transfer to another person by means of writing it down or verbalizing it. The opposite of tacit knowledge is explicit knowledge. In the context of industrial property (now generally viewed as intellectual property (IP)), know-how is a component in the transfer of technology in national and international environments, co-existing with or separate from other IP rights such as patents, trademarks and copyright and is an economic asset.
Copyright is a set of exclusive rights granted to the author or creator of an original work, including the right to copy, distribute and adapt the work. Copyright does not protect ideas, only their expression. In most jurisdictions copyright arises upon fixation and does not need to be registered. Copyright owners have the exclusive statutory right to exercise control over copying and other exploitation of the works for a specific period of time, after which the work is said to enter the public domain. Uses covered under limitations and exceptions to copyright, such as fair use, do not require permission from the copyright owner. All other uses require permission. Copyright owners can license or permanently transfer or assign their exclusive rights to others. Initially copyright law only applied to the copying of books. Over time other uses such as translations and derivative works were made subject to copyright. Copyright now covers a wide range of works, including maps, sheet music, dramatic works, paintings, photographs, sound recordings, motion pictures and computer programs.
A Trademark or Trade Mark or Trade-Mark is a distinctive sign or indicator used by an individual, business organization, or other legal entity to identify that the products or services to consumers with which the trademark appears originate from a unique source, and to distinguish its products or services from those of other entities. A trademark is typically a name, word, phrase, logo, symbol, design, image, or a combination of these elements. There is also a range of non-conventional trademarks comprising marks which do not fall into these standard categories, such as those based on color, smell, or sound. The owner of a registered trademark may commence legal proceedings for trademark infringement to prevent unauthorized use of that trademark. However, registration is not required. The owner of a common law trademark may also file suit, but an unregistered mark may be protectable only within the geographical area within which it has been used or in geographical areas into which it may be reasonably expected to expand. The term trademark is also used informally to refer to any distinguishing attribute by which an individual is readily identified, such as the well-known characteristics of celebrities. When a trademark is used in relation to services rather than products, it may sometimes be called a service mark, particularly in the United States.
A trademark may be designated by the following symbols:
™ (for an unregistered trade mark, that is, a mark used to promote or brand goods)
℠ (for an unregistered service mark, that is, a mark used to promote or brand services)
® (for a registered trademark)
Trademarks and Copyrights can be important forms of protection of products or symbols used to recognize a product. There may be approaches to protecting aspects of computer programs. But the real bread winners are the IP and Know-how. IP and Know-how are essential to the success of the company as they are what make NewCo special and provide a moat around the business. As far as Know-how, it will be a secret as long as you can keep the information secret. Know-how is the special sauce that goes into your company. It is something only NewCo knows and now public information is available that a competitor can use to reproduce your special sauce. For example, try to find out how to make a Coke. This info has been closely guarded for nearly 100 years.
The rights associated with the patent portion of the IP help identify markets and potential value. The IP helps keep the competition away for some period of time and provides you a legal monopoly for as much as 20 years. A patent will define claims which you can use to take an infringer to court and attempt to stop them from making a product you own the rights to.
What is a patent? Think of a patent as a deed to property, like the deed to your home. You actually have ownership and rights to keep others out of your home. You can sell the home, rent it, or just allow the home to just set and do nothing. It is your home to do with as you please; within the limits of the law. Patents are similar. Once the patent issues, it defines the technology or products you have invented and have rights of ownership. You can develop the technology, license it, sell it, and you have the unique ability to prevent anyone from selling something that is covered by your patent.
Sometimes when I discuss NewCos with entrepreneurs there is confusion about what a patent does and does not mean to the company. As just stated, a patent DOES allow you to prevent someone from selling your product. A patent DOES NOT automatically give the rights needed to sell a product. When preparing a patent, it is a like blowing a bubble in a rose bush. You want to blow the bubble as large as you can to fill the empty spaces, but if you blow it too large it will burst. The first patent issued in completely new field will make every effort to cover as much of the field as possible. As other inventors file for their new inventions in the field, they will attempt to cover uses, areas, and products not contemplated in the original patent or other issued patents in the field.
Sometimes companies refer to the original patent as an UMBRELLA PATENT because of its very nature of trying to cover the whole field of a technology area and because it provides very broad coverage. Assume, you invented and a patented table salt. Your new patented invention now has a full term before expiration which is like the umbrella covering as much of the space as possible. As the first patent in the field you attempted to cover the composition (make-up or chemical structure) of salt and therefore have a patent covering Composition of Matter; i.e. chemical makeup. Uses of the chemical which are claimed in the patent cover making food taste better and preserving food. Later, one of your competitors discovered the chemical can be used to make a great toothpaste additive and they file a patent for a particular use as toothpaste. The original inventor never contemplated this use and it was not described in the first original patent. Also, the use was not something that a person with knowledge of field would consider as obvious. The patent examiner approved and allowed issuance of a Field of Use patent for salt as an additive to a toothpaste. The owner of the composition of matter patent would not be able to practice the invention of use as toothpaste without first obtaining the rights from the inventor of the toothpaste, and the inventor of the toothpaste would not be able to sell the product without obtaining rights from the composition of matter patent. This may sound a bit complicated and it can be very complicated when dealing with technology inventions in areas that have been around a while. Essentially, these patents Block or Prevent the other inventor from particular uses or applications and each would need to obtain the rights of the other to commercialize the product.
The patent landscape around a product is of such a significant importance, that many BigCos and potential investors will ask the NewCos if they have obtained a Non-infringement Opinion Letter or a Freedom-to-Practice or Freedom-to-Operate Opinion from their legal counsel. Most often the response to BigCo is No we do not have the financial resources to do that now. While these are extremely important documents that help provide confidence that you can make and sell the products from your invention, these legal opinions are extremely expensive and most NewCos cannot afford them. As an example, in a company where I was facing potential litigation with a competitor, it cost $100K to get a Non-infringement Opinion Letter and I received a quote of $500K for a Freedom to Operate Opinion. We paid the $100K but could not afford the more comprehensive opinion letter. When first starting out, most companies could not even pay the $100K and would rather spend the funds to advance the technology. This does not mean the letters are not important, but if you cannot afford them you must try to gather as much information as possible to help address the questions from a potential investor.
To sum up, I want to make several important points:
· Having a patent gives the right to prevent others from selling a product,
· Having a patent may NOT give all of the rights needed to sell a product
· A patent review of all fields related to your product is needed to identify any blocking IP for your product
· You will need to acquire rights to any blocking IP and those rights will cost something (a topic
to discuss later)
· You need to have a good patent counsel to help with ALL of your IP issues
As always, I hope you are following along in the series and will feel free to email me with your questions. The topic of IP is essential to grasp before going further. This topic will be broken down to small segments. I am not attempting to provide any legal advice nor am I the person to do so. But, you do need to understand the basics to help direct your next steps in creating a company and talking with your legal counsel. Once the section on IP is completed, we can discuss technology and obtaining IP right.
Small-Business Guide to Intellectual Property
By DARREN DAHL
The two most precious resources for any small-business owner are time and money. That’s why when the subject of intellectual property comes up, many owners run in the other direction. They see images of expensive lawyers and use that as an excuse to ignore the topic, reasoning that it is a problem for big companies to worry about.
The trouble is, with the rise of competition through the Internet and on the global market, understanding intellectual property is more critical than ever for small-business owners. Let’s explore some of the common fallacies:
1. For small-business owners, it’s not worth the time or effort to secure intellectual property rights.
Daniel Lubetzky, chief executive of New York City-based Kind Snacks, had high hopes when he and his company attended the Natural Products Expo West in Anaheim, Calif., in March. And who could blame him, since his Kind Plus bars had been named the best new product at the Natural Products Expo East last October?
But it didn’t take long before Mr. Lubetzky knew something had gone wrong: He kept hearing how one of his competitors had copied the packaging, look and feel of his bars.
Fortunately for Mr. Lubetzky, he had secured crucial components of intellectual property like trademarks, trade dress (the look and feel of a product) and Web addresses after founding his company. Unlike a patent, which can cost up to $25,000 to secure, trademarks and Web addresses can be obtained relatively cheaply and without the aid of a lawyer.
With the legal documentation to back up his intellectual property rights, Mr. Lubetzky sent the offending company a cease-and-desist letter, which achieved the desired result. “Too many entrepreneurs forget there is more to I.P. than just patents,” said Mr. Lubetzky, who happens to be a lawyer.
2. Once I get a trademark, my brand is safe.
It may be. But consider what happened to Tracey Deschaine, who runs a restaurant called Dixie Picnic in Ocean City, N.J.
When Ms. Deschaine opened her business in 2006, she secured trademarks on her business name and logo and on the name of her signature item, “upcakes,” which are upside-down frosted cupcakes. The problem, she says, was that even though she had obtained the trademarks, someone monitoring the activity on the United States Patent and Trademark Office’s Web site had spotted her application and secured upcakes.com as the Web address, or U.R.L., before she could.
“I had no idea that even though I have a trademark, someone else could just go register the U.R.L.,” she said. “I wish I had planned ahead and bought the site before I did that.”
3. Having a patent gives me the right to produce something.
This is a very fundamental misunderstanding. Actually, what a patent does is give you the right to prevent someone else from producing what your patent covers. “Having a strong I.P. position helps ensure that other people pay you for your innovation like they would a toll on a road,” Mr. Kocher said.
But even if you do have a patent, there’s no guarantee that someone won’t try to get around it. There’s also no guarantee that you will win if you fight that person. But if you have your I.P. ducks in a row and a commitment to do whatever you can to defend those rights, you do have a fighting chance — even in a fight against a much larger company.
Consider the example of Cryptography Research, a 20-employee technology firm in San Francisco that specializes in data security. Beginning in 2004, the company made the decision to pursue litigation against the credit card giant Visa, which Cryptography asserted was infringing on its patents covering smart cards. To pursue the case against Visa, however, Cryptography’s founder, Paul Kocher, knew he needed a serious war chest in addition to his patent portfolio.
Read More >> http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/06/business/smallbusiness/06guide.htmlA
The two most precious resources for any small-business owner are time and money. That’s why when the subject of intellectual property comes up, many owners run in the other direction. They see images of expensive lawyers and use that as an excuse to ignore the topic, reasoning that it is a problem for big companies to worry about.
The trouble is, with the rise of competition through the Internet and on the global market, understanding intellectual property is more critical than ever for small-business owners. Let’s explore some of the common fallacies:
1. For small-business owners, it’s not worth the time or effort to secure intellectual property rights.
Daniel Lubetzky, chief executive of New York City-based Kind Snacks, had high hopes when he and his company attended the Natural Products Expo West in Anaheim, Calif., in March. And who could blame him, since his Kind Plus bars had been named the best new product at the Natural Products Expo East last October?
But it didn’t take long before Mr. Lubetzky knew something had gone wrong: He kept hearing how one of his competitors had copied the packaging, look and feel of his bars.
Fortunately for Mr. Lubetzky, he had secured crucial components of intellectual property like trademarks, trade dress (the look and feel of a product) and Web addresses after founding his company. Unlike a patent, which can cost up to $25,000 to secure, trademarks and Web addresses can be obtained relatively cheaply and without the aid of a lawyer.
With the legal documentation to back up his intellectual property rights, Mr. Lubetzky sent the offending company a cease-and-desist letter, which achieved the desired result. “Too many entrepreneurs forget there is more to I.P. than just patents,” said Mr. Lubetzky, who happens to be a lawyer.
2. Once I get a trademark, my brand is safe.
It may be. But consider what happened to Tracey Deschaine, who runs a restaurant called Dixie Picnic in Ocean City, N.J.
When Ms. Deschaine opened her business in 2006, she secured trademarks on her business name and logo and on the name of her signature item, “upcakes,” which are upside-down frosted cupcakes. The problem, she says, was that even though she had obtained the trademarks, someone monitoring the activity on the United States Patent and Trademark Office’s Web site had spotted her application and secured upcakes.com as the Web address, or U.R.L., before she could.
“I had no idea that even though I have a trademark, someone else could just go register the U.R.L.,” she said. “I wish I had planned ahead and bought the site before I did that.”
3. Having a patent gives me the right to produce something.
This is a very fundamental misunderstanding. Actually, what a patent does is give you the right to prevent someone else from producing what your patent covers. “Having a strong I.P. position helps ensure that other people pay you for your innovation like they would a toll on a road,” Mr. Kocher said.
But even if you do have a patent, there’s no guarantee that someone won’t try to get around it. There’s also no guarantee that you will win if you fight that person. But if you have your I.P. ducks in a row and a commitment to do whatever you can to defend those rights, you do have a fighting chance — even in a fight against a much larger company.
Consider the example of Cryptography Research, a 20-employee technology firm in San Francisco that specializes in data security. Beginning in 2004, the company made the decision to pursue litigation against the credit card giant Visa, which Cryptography asserted was infringing on its patents covering smart cards. To pursue the case against Visa, however, Cryptography’s founder, Paul Kocher, knew he needed a serious war chest in addition to his patent portfolio.
Read More >> http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/06/business/smallbusiness/06guide.htmlA
Intellectual property protection in China
By: Richard Li and Joy Jiao
The Chinese market presents tremendous opportunities, but also fierce competition. As the level of development of the Chinese economy increases, brand effect and the fruits of technical innovation play an ever larger role in market competition. If these intangible assets are not protected, they could fall onto the plates of hungry competitors.
Liu Minxuan, a senior partner at AllBright Law Offices in Shanghai, recounts that a new venture became a leader in its industry after several years of hard work. However, when it tried to register on the Tmall platform, it discovered that the trademark in Class 35 required for identification by Tmall had long ago been preemptively registered by a direct competitor.
Although that company was eventually able to preliminarily recover its trademark, “It frustratingly discovered that pirates had preceded it in pirating its trademark in nearly all of the other classes, greatly hampering the development of its business and exposing it to risks everywhere,” says Liu Minxuan.
“If that company had placed greater weight on intellectual property [IP] protection from the outset, registering its trademark in a greater number of classes, it likely would not have needed to desperately wage an all out war on each trademark [class], as now.”
Enterprises must learn how to use the law, as a shield to protect their IP rights, and as a sword to attack infringers. Fortunately, as China has placed increasingly greater importance on the protection of enterprises’ innovations and brand building, the legal weapons available to enterprises have become more potent.
Helen Cheng, an equity partner at Zhong Lun Law Firm in Shanghai, says that the Opinions of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council on Improving the Property Rights Protection System and Lawfully Protecting Property Rights, and the Opinions of the Supreme People’s Court on Fully Leveraging the Adjudication Function to Duly Enhance Judicial Protection of Property Rights, issued in November 2016, and the Outline for the Judicial Protection of Intellectual Property in China (2016-2020) issued by the Supreme People’s Court (SPC) in April 2017, all contain important provisions that will drive and assist in the establishment of an IP punitive damages system.
“It can be seen that China has in recent years consistently been endeavouring to intensify IP protection, intensify the punishment of bad faith infringement and force up the costs of infringement,” she says. “This trend will be of great assistance when enterprises claim damages against infringers through judicial means, and will also increase the deterrent effect on infringers to a certain extent.”
The Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress issued the Second Deliberation Draft of the Bill to Revise the Law Against Unfair Competition in September 2017. Han Jinwen, a partner at AnJie Law Firm in Beijing, states that, “according to the bill, the Law Against Unfair Competition proposes to increase the measure of damages for acts of unfair competition to RMB3 million (US$450,000), which is consistent with the rate for statutory damages specified in the current Trademark Law, greatly increasing the protection of rights holders.”
Severely cracking down on bad faith infringement was one of the key topics at both the China Trademark Festival and the China Patent Annual Conference held in early September 2017. During the Trademark Festival, the Trademark Office sponsored a practical forum entitled Stifling Bad Faith Registration in the Substantive Trademark Examination Procedure and Exploration of Hot Button Issues. At the Patent Annual Conference, the Commissioner of the State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO) also mentioned in particular that his office would introduce punitive damage measures to intensify patent protection and drive up the cost of infringement.
“This will have a major impact on enterprises’ brand building and protection of innovation,” says Chen Hao, a senior partner at DHH Law Firm in Beijing. “On the one hand, this will have a certain deterrent effect on bad faith infringers, will be conducive to cleaning up the IP environment, embolden enterprises to innovate, and reduce enterprises’ rights protection costs. On the other hand, in IP rights protection cases, [the aggrieved enterprise can] adduce evidence attesting to the infringer’s free riding on the well-known trademark or hoarding of trademarks, greatly increasing the probability of prevailing.”
Instances of winning the case but losing the market have been common in the past. Zhao Ye, a partner at DeHeng Law Offices in Beijing, argues that the most obvious judicial trend in recent times has been the increase in the amount of damages awarded by the courts. “Although the Supreme Court proposed increasing the measure of damages numerous times in the past 10 years, [until recently] there was no obvious change,” he says. “This round of changes began with the birth of the IP courts, particularly after 2016, when the Beijing Intellectual Property Court considerably increased the amount of damages awarded, leading the courts around the country in increasing the measure of damages.
Read More >> https://www.vantageasia.com/intellectual-property-protection-china/
The Chinese market presents tremendous opportunities, but also fierce competition. As the level of development of the Chinese economy increases, brand effect and the fruits of technical innovation play an ever larger role in market competition. If these intangible assets are not protected, they could fall onto the plates of hungry competitors.
Liu Minxuan, a senior partner at AllBright Law Offices in Shanghai, recounts that a new venture became a leader in its industry after several years of hard work. However, when it tried to register on the Tmall platform, it discovered that the trademark in Class 35 required for identification by Tmall had long ago been preemptively registered by a direct competitor.
Although that company was eventually able to preliminarily recover its trademark, “It frustratingly discovered that pirates had preceded it in pirating its trademark in nearly all of the other classes, greatly hampering the development of its business and exposing it to risks everywhere,” says Liu Minxuan.
“If that company had placed greater weight on intellectual property [IP] protection from the outset, registering its trademark in a greater number of classes, it likely would not have needed to desperately wage an all out war on each trademark [class], as now.”
Enterprises must learn how to use the law, as a shield to protect their IP rights, and as a sword to attack infringers. Fortunately, as China has placed increasingly greater importance on the protection of enterprises’ innovations and brand building, the legal weapons available to enterprises have become more potent.
Helen Cheng, an equity partner at Zhong Lun Law Firm in Shanghai, says that the Opinions of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council on Improving the Property Rights Protection System and Lawfully Protecting Property Rights, and the Opinions of the Supreme People’s Court on Fully Leveraging the Adjudication Function to Duly Enhance Judicial Protection of Property Rights, issued in November 2016, and the Outline for the Judicial Protection of Intellectual Property in China (2016-2020) issued by the Supreme People’s Court (SPC) in April 2017, all contain important provisions that will drive and assist in the establishment of an IP punitive damages system.
“It can be seen that China has in recent years consistently been endeavouring to intensify IP protection, intensify the punishment of bad faith infringement and force up the costs of infringement,” she says. “This trend will be of great assistance when enterprises claim damages against infringers through judicial means, and will also increase the deterrent effect on infringers to a certain extent.”
The Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress issued the Second Deliberation Draft of the Bill to Revise the Law Against Unfair Competition in September 2017. Han Jinwen, a partner at AnJie Law Firm in Beijing, states that, “according to the bill, the Law Against Unfair Competition proposes to increase the measure of damages for acts of unfair competition to RMB3 million (US$450,000), which is consistent with the rate for statutory damages specified in the current Trademark Law, greatly increasing the protection of rights holders.”
Severely cracking down on bad faith infringement was one of the key topics at both the China Trademark Festival and the China Patent Annual Conference held in early September 2017. During the Trademark Festival, the Trademark Office sponsored a practical forum entitled Stifling Bad Faith Registration in the Substantive Trademark Examination Procedure and Exploration of Hot Button Issues. At the Patent Annual Conference, the Commissioner of the State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO) also mentioned in particular that his office would introduce punitive damage measures to intensify patent protection and drive up the cost of infringement.
“This will have a major impact on enterprises’ brand building and protection of innovation,” says Chen Hao, a senior partner at DHH Law Firm in Beijing. “On the one hand, this will have a certain deterrent effect on bad faith infringers, will be conducive to cleaning up the IP environment, embolden enterprises to innovate, and reduce enterprises’ rights protection costs. On the other hand, in IP rights protection cases, [the aggrieved enterprise can] adduce evidence attesting to the infringer’s free riding on the well-known trademark or hoarding of trademarks, greatly increasing the probability of prevailing.”
Instances of winning the case but losing the market have been common in the past. Zhao Ye, a partner at DeHeng Law Offices in Beijing, argues that the most obvious judicial trend in recent times has been the increase in the amount of damages awarded by the courts. “Although the Supreme Court proposed increasing the measure of damages numerous times in the past 10 years, [until recently] there was no obvious change,” he says. “This round of changes began with the birth of the IP courts, particularly after 2016, when the Beijing Intellectual Property Court considerably increased the amount of damages awarded, leading the courts around the country in increasing the measure of damages.
Read More >> https://www.vantageasia.com/intellectual-property-protection-china/
New Patent Suggests We Will See A Foldable iPhone In The Future
By Danica Simic
This year’s Thanksgiving is exciting for many reasons. The U.S. Patent & Trademark Office published Apple’s patent application regarding a possible iPhone model with a foldable screen. There have been various rumors suggesting that Samsung is working on a foldable device, but also other tech giants are working on a foldable device. So, are we going to see a foldable iPhone in the future?
The patent has been filed with the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office and mentioned on Patently Apple. The patent suggests a mobile device equipped with flexible components that allow it to fold itself. That means that the device will likely sport a flexible screen. The flexible display of the patent may be equipped with a flexible display layer, a cover layer, a touch sensor, which is located between the flexible display layer and the cover layer.
Basically, according to the patent, the foldable iPhone may be equipped with a display that you can open and close like a book. If you remember, the first report suggesting a device with folding capabilities was almost one year ago. It was said that several companies are teaming up with LG in order to create a device with a design. A new report emerged just one month ago, and it suggests that Apple planned to work with LG to make a foldable display for its iPhones, according to the Investor.
However, it is worth mentioning that both reports referred to an OLED panel, which is used in the iPhone X that came out this month. Also, last month The Investor reported that although Apple partnered with LG, the new foldable iPhone might still be years away, and may not launch until 2020.
The device will likely be made using flexible adhesive and a shape memory alloy or amorphous metal. The patent also mentions Liquidmetal as a possible material which may be used in the new device. It is worth mentioning that Apple has exclusive rights to the amorphous material, although didn’t use it much for its electronic devices.
According to the patent, there is also a possibility of the foldable device using micro-LED display, which is thinner than OLED, which is used on the iPhone X. The micro-LED display is also more energy efficient compared to the currently used OLED. Apple has moved to OLED displays for its iPhone X, and with that in mind, it would be strange for the company to switch to micro-LED anytime soon. But, if the iPhone X won’t launch until 2020, there is a possibility the company won’t adopt the new technology until then.
What do you think? Who will launch the phone with a foldable screen first? Apple or Samsung?
This City Is Promoting 'Beach Lifestyle' as the Ultimate Startup Perk
By Lisa Abeyta
If your magical winter wonderland has turned into mounds of sludgy, gray snow, you may be wondering how Bing Crosby could ever record a song asking for more cold weather.
You may have also started to wonder if you have what it takes to spend another winter shoveling sidewalks or spending 10 minutes bundling up just to walk outside. If you're ready to give it up and head to a warmer climate, one city is ready to roll out the welcome mat for you.
The City of Carlsbad Economic Development Division in Southern California is taking advantage of one of their best assets--lifestyle--and turning it into a mantra for attracting new companies and talent to the area: Life in Action.
While Carlsbad may be slightly less famous when it comes to vacation destinations than nearby neighbor, San Diego, it's a top pick for surfers, skaters, and, of course, Lego-lovers who flock to the family theme park Legoland. Famed skater Tony Hawk, who was born in Carlsbad, also spearheaded development of the first skate park ever built in the U.S.
The city is also home to seven exquisite miles of shoreline and some of the most popular locations for surfers and campers.
But the city is far more than a tourist attraction.
"Between our concentration of action sports companies and global leaders in technology, Carlsbad's Life in Action campaign introduces people to the most exciting sectors in our city and the business culture of encouraging an active lifestyle," said Christie Marcella, Economic Development Manager for the City of Carlsbad. "The climate, physical environment, and community here are the foundation for inspiring entrepreneurs and businesses."
Carlsbad's efforts to attract new companies and talent seems to be working. 63 startups were launched between 2014 and 2015--an impressive number given that the city's entire population is slightly above 112,000 people, making it similar in size to other U.S. cities, like Cambridge, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston, and Westminster, Colorado - a suburb of Denver, and Fargo, North Dakota.
Last spring, I had the chance to visit with other startup founders in the region, and discovered a common thread among them: That it wasn't necessary to sacrifice having a life to grow a business.
Some of the region's better known companies have obvious ties to the outdoor lifestyle.
The headquarters of the outdoor lifestyle clothing company, prAna Living, boasts an outdoor climbing area while the nearly beach-front campus of GoPro, a global digital imaging company, includes large indoor areas for collaborative viewing, outdoor showers and stalls to store surf boards, bikes and other recreational gear.
Carlsbad's promise of "the good life" is also attracting companies more commonly found in Silicon Valley.
Global science research lab Thermo Fisher, with over 50,000 employees worldwide and $17 million in revenue, is headquartered in Carlsbad, which has been a boon for the company in attracting workers for high-demand engineering jobs.
Says Mark Field, Chief Technology Officer and VP, SW Engineering, "Tijuana in an hour away, and Tijuana graduates about the same number of software engineers as the U.S. It's become a great resource for American companies who often can't find enough engineers."
Of course, some companies are based in Carlsbad because it is home to their founders, including the global pharmaceutical firm, Ionis. Founded in 1989, over half of the company's original team still remains almost three decades later. In fact, the company experiences less than 5% annual turnover where the industry average is 27%.
Stanley Crooke, M.D., Ph.D., who serves as Founder, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, credits the loyalty of his team to their mission. "Sick people depend on us. If that doesn't at least make you catch your breath a little bit, you probably don't want to come here. The challenges are substantial, and the benefit to the patients we hope is even more substantial."
Ionis recently moved into a larger facility, which is never an easy decision. "Startups get used to living cheap, but it's amazing how much benefit it's been. People like coming to work here. In this world of hyper-specialization, people tend to see the world as separate, but life is one fabric, so we have art everywhere, a gym, full-court basketball, outdoor walking trails ... it's a happy place. It's not an easy place - stress, high drive, intense - but happy."
The drug company has also secured numerous patents - a fairly common occurrence for companies in Carlsbad. Some 6933 patent applications were filed between 2008-2016, and more than 650 patents of those issued to Carlsbad businesses were issued within the past year.
That works out to about 12 patents for every 1,000 workers, a rate that significantly outpaces larger innovation hubs like San Francisco, San Diego, and San Jose.
If a team can file for a patent in the morning and spend the late afternoon catching waves, it certainly begs the question of whether it might time to give up the snow shovel.
The folks in Carlsbad certainly think so.
If your magical winter wonderland has turned into mounds of sludgy, gray snow, you may be wondering how Bing Crosby could ever record a song asking for more cold weather.
You may have also started to wonder if you have what it takes to spend another winter shoveling sidewalks or spending 10 minutes bundling up just to walk outside. If you're ready to give it up and head to a warmer climate, one city is ready to roll out the welcome mat for you.
The City of Carlsbad Economic Development Division in Southern California is taking advantage of one of their best assets--lifestyle--and turning it into a mantra for attracting new companies and talent to the area: Life in Action.
While Carlsbad may be slightly less famous when it comes to vacation destinations than nearby neighbor, San Diego, it's a top pick for surfers, skaters, and, of course, Lego-lovers who flock to the family theme park Legoland. Famed skater Tony Hawk, who was born in Carlsbad, also spearheaded development of the first skate park ever built in the U.S.
The city is also home to seven exquisite miles of shoreline and some of the most popular locations for surfers and campers.
But the city is far more than a tourist attraction.
"Between our concentration of action sports companies and global leaders in technology, Carlsbad's Life in Action campaign introduces people to the most exciting sectors in our city and the business culture of encouraging an active lifestyle," said Christie Marcella, Economic Development Manager for the City of Carlsbad. "The climate, physical environment, and community here are the foundation for inspiring entrepreneurs and businesses."
Carlsbad's efforts to attract new companies and talent seems to be working. 63 startups were launched between 2014 and 2015--an impressive number given that the city's entire population is slightly above 112,000 people, making it similar in size to other U.S. cities, like Cambridge, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston, and Westminster, Colorado - a suburb of Denver, and Fargo, North Dakota.
Last spring, I had the chance to visit with other startup founders in the region, and discovered a common thread among them: That it wasn't necessary to sacrifice having a life to grow a business.
Some of the region's better known companies have obvious ties to the outdoor lifestyle.
The headquarters of the outdoor lifestyle clothing company, prAna Living, boasts an outdoor climbing area while the nearly beach-front campus of GoPro, a global digital imaging company, includes large indoor areas for collaborative viewing, outdoor showers and stalls to store surf boards, bikes and other recreational gear.
Carlsbad's promise of "the good life" is also attracting companies more commonly found in Silicon Valley.
Global science research lab Thermo Fisher, with over 50,000 employees worldwide and $17 million in revenue, is headquartered in Carlsbad, which has been a boon for the company in attracting workers for high-demand engineering jobs.
Says Mark Field, Chief Technology Officer and VP, SW Engineering, "Tijuana in an hour away, and Tijuana graduates about the same number of software engineers as the U.S. It's become a great resource for American companies who often can't find enough engineers."
Of course, some companies are based in Carlsbad because it is home to their founders, including the global pharmaceutical firm, Ionis. Founded in 1989, over half of the company's original team still remains almost three decades later. In fact, the company experiences less than 5% annual turnover where the industry average is 27%.
Stanley Crooke, M.D., Ph.D., who serves as Founder, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, credits the loyalty of his team to their mission. "Sick people depend on us. If that doesn't at least make you catch your breath a little bit, you probably don't want to come here. The challenges are substantial, and the benefit to the patients we hope is even more substantial."
Ionis recently moved into a larger facility, which is never an easy decision. "Startups get used to living cheap, but it's amazing how much benefit it's been. People like coming to work here. In this world of hyper-specialization, people tend to see the world as separate, but life is one fabric, so we have art everywhere, a gym, full-court basketball, outdoor walking trails ... it's a happy place. It's not an easy place - stress, high drive, intense - but happy."
The drug company has also secured numerous patents - a fairly common occurrence for companies in Carlsbad. Some 6933 patent applications were filed between 2008-2016, and more than 650 patents of those issued to Carlsbad businesses were issued within the past year.
That works out to about 12 patents for every 1,000 workers, a rate that significantly outpaces larger innovation hubs like San Francisco, San Diego, and San Jose.
If a team can file for a patent in the morning and spend the late afternoon catching waves, it certainly begs the question of whether it might time to give up the snow shovel.
The folks in Carlsbad certainly think so.
Velcro Companies Comments On Successful Jury Verdict In U.S. Patent Case
By: Velcro Companies-Nov 29, 2017
BOSTON, Nov. 29, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Velcro Companies won an important jury verdict in a patent lawsuit brought by YKK Corporation. The jury concluded that Velcro Companies' VELCRO® Brand fasteners do not infringe YKK's patent.
"We are pleased to have won a favorable jury verdict following a four-year lawsuit against YKK Corporation," said Fraser Cameron, President and CEO of Velcro Companies. "Innovation is what drives our work and has been deeply rooted in the company since its founding more than 60 years ago. We strongly believe in ethical conduct and the value of intellectual property, and we take care to ensure our new products do not infringe on existing patents. We are pleased the jury in this case agreed with us."
In August 2013 YKK sued Velcro Companies – its primary rival in the transportation and automotive segment of the hook-and-loop fastener business – for patent infringement with the goal of obtaining an injunction and removing VELCRO® Brand 4Gi and MH4 hook fasteners from the transportation market. Many cars in the U.S. with fabric or leather covers use hook fastener strips embedded in seat cushions to secure seat trim covers, so a large market was at risk. The jury delivered a complete defense verdict of non-infringement, finding that Velcro Companies' VELCRO® Brand fasteners do not infringe YKK's patent.
The case is YKK Corporation et al v. Velcro USA Inc. (Middle District of Georgia). Velcro Companies was represented by Fish & Richardson (https://www.fr.com).
About Velcro Companies
Velcro Companies is a technology-driven, global organization providing fastening solutions that solve problems in simple, elegant and surprising ways for businesses and consumers around the world. We have a heritage of innovation spanning more than 50 years and own over 400 active patents and numerous trademarks, including the VELCRO® trademark, which is registered throughout the world. We develop and deliver solutions for customers through an integrated production and service system that includes manufacturing locations in the United States, Belgium, Canada, Mexico, Uruguay, Spain and China and sales offices around the world. To buy genuine VELCRO® brand products and to find out more about our company, visit www.velcro.com and www.dontsayvelcro.com.
Note to editors:
At Velcro Companies, we are proud that VELCRO® brand products have become a part of everyday life, but that ubiquity sometimes produces confusion. The VELCRO® trademark should be used only when referring to genuine VELCRO® brand fasteners. Non-VELCRO® brand products should be identified by their functional terms, such as "hook and loop," "self-adhesive straps," and so forth. The VELCRO® mark should always be used as an adjective and never as a noun or a verb. The term "Velcro Companies" should be used when referring to our company and its executives.
The proper use of the VELCRO® trademark assists us in safeguarding the integrity of the VELCRO® brand, and helps to protect consumers from products incorrectly sold as VELCRO® brand products. For further information on the proper use of the VELCRO® trademark, please see the guidelines on our website.
About Fish & Richardson
Fish & Richardson is a global patent prosecution, intellectual property litigation, and commercial litigation law firm with more than 400 attorneys and technology specialists in the U.S. and Europe. Our success is rooted in our creative and inclusive culture, which values the diversity of people, experiences, and perspectives. Fish is the No. 1 U.S. patent litigation firm, handling nearly three times as many cases as its nearest competitor; a powerhouse patent prosecution firm; a top-tier trademark and copyright firm; and the No. 1 firm at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, with more cases than any other firm. Since 1878, Fish attorneys have been winning cases worth billions in controversy – often by making new law – for the world's most innovative and influential technology leaders. For more information, visit https://www.fr.com or follow us at @FishRichardson.
SOURCE Velcro Companies
Related Links
http://www.velcro.com
BOSTON, Nov. 29, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Velcro Companies won an important jury verdict in a patent lawsuit brought by YKK Corporation. The jury concluded that Velcro Companies' VELCRO® Brand fasteners do not infringe YKK's patent.
"We are pleased to have won a favorable jury verdict following a four-year lawsuit against YKK Corporation," said Fraser Cameron, President and CEO of Velcro Companies. "Innovation is what drives our work and has been deeply rooted in the company since its founding more than 60 years ago. We strongly believe in ethical conduct and the value of intellectual property, and we take care to ensure our new products do not infringe on existing patents. We are pleased the jury in this case agreed with us."
In August 2013 YKK sued Velcro Companies – its primary rival in the transportation and automotive segment of the hook-and-loop fastener business – for patent infringement with the goal of obtaining an injunction and removing VELCRO® Brand 4Gi and MH4 hook fasteners from the transportation market. Many cars in the U.S. with fabric or leather covers use hook fastener strips embedded in seat cushions to secure seat trim covers, so a large market was at risk. The jury delivered a complete defense verdict of non-infringement, finding that Velcro Companies' VELCRO® Brand fasteners do not infringe YKK's patent.
The case is YKK Corporation et al v. Velcro USA Inc. (Middle District of Georgia). Velcro Companies was represented by Fish & Richardson (https://www.fr.com).
About Velcro Companies
Velcro Companies is a technology-driven, global organization providing fastening solutions that solve problems in simple, elegant and surprising ways for businesses and consumers around the world. We have a heritage of innovation spanning more than 50 years and own over 400 active patents and numerous trademarks, including the VELCRO® trademark, which is registered throughout the world. We develop and deliver solutions for customers through an integrated production and service system that includes manufacturing locations in the United States, Belgium, Canada, Mexico, Uruguay, Spain and China and sales offices around the world. To buy genuine VELCRO® brand products and to find out more about our company, visit www.velcro.com and www.dontsayvelcro.com.
Note to editors:
At Velcro Companies, we are proud that VELCRO® brand products have become a part of everyday life, but that ubiquity sometimes produces confusion. The VELCRO® trademark should be used only when referring to genuine VELCRO® brand fasteners. Non-VELCRO® brand products should be identified by their functional terms, such as "hook and loop," "self-adhesive straps," and so forth. The VELCRO® mark should always be used as an adjective and never as a noun or a verb. The term "Velcro Companies" should be used when referring to our company and its executives.
The proper use of the VELCRO® trademark assists us in safeguarding the integrity of the VELCRO® brand, and helps to protect consumers from products incorrectly sold as VELCRO® brand products. For further information on the proper use of the VELCRO® trademark, please see the guidelines on our website.
About Fish & Richardson
Fish & Richardson is a global patent prosecution, intellectual property litigation, and commercial litigation law firm with more than 400 attorneys and technology specialists in the U.S. and Europe. Our success is rooted in our creative and inclusive culture, which values the diversity of people, experiences, and perspectives. Fish is the No. 1 U.S. patent litigation firm, handling nearly three times as many cases as its nearest competitor; a powerhouse patent prosecution firm; a top-tier trademark and copyright firm; and the No. 1 firm at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, with more cases than any other firm. Since 1878, Fish attorneys have been winning cases worth billions in controversy – often by making new law – for the world's most innovative and influential technology leaders. For more information, visit https://www.fr.com or follow us at @FishRichardson.
SOURCE Velcro Companies
Related Links
http://www.velcro.com
Startups Intellectual Property Right Protection Scheme
By Aapka Consultant - November 30, 2017
Intellectual Property Rights are very important asset for Startups in India and it is important to protect them by taking effective measures. Intellectual Property Rights are very effective tool for any Business Organisation to boost Industrial Competitiveness. Various business groups should focus to protect their IP (Intellectual Property) along with other important things. The Startup India Action Plan 2016 through the “Scheme for Facilitating Startups Intellectual Property Protection” promotes Intellectual Property Registration. The scheme for facilitating Startups Intellectual Property Protection is made to protect Patent, Trademarks and Designs of Startups.
Scheme for Facilitating Startups Intellectual Property protection (SIPP)
The scheme is released by the Office of Comptroller General of Patents Designs and Trademarks on 22nd April 2016 with the objective to protect and promote Intellectual Property Rights awareness for Startups in India. By this scheme the appointment of experienced and registered Trade Marks /patent Agents as Facilitator to guide and help the Startups in matters relating to protection of Intellectual Property. The Startups shall not have to pay any kind of fees for availing services from the Facilitators because they are directly paid by the Central Government. The Objective of this Scheme is to assist the Startups in protection and promotion of their Intellectual Property by providing good IP services. This Scheme is designed to promote awareness and adoption of Intellectual Property Rights.
Intellectual Property Facilitators
For the effective implementation of the scheme the Controller General of Patent, Trademark and Design appoint Facilitators to assist the Startups in protecting the Intellectual Property Rights. There is a list of persons who can be appointed as Facilitators:
Any Patent Agent registered with the Controller General of patent, Design, Trademark (CGPDTM)
Any Trademark Agent registered with the Controller General of Patent, Design, Trademark (CGPDTM)
Any Advocate as defined under The Advocates Act, 1961 who is actively involved in filing and disposal of applications for Patents, Trademarks and Designs.
Government Departments, Organisation, Agencies.
Functions of Facilitators
The functions of Facilitators are decided by the Controller General of Patent, Design, and Trademark (CGPDTM). The Facilitators provides following Intellectual Property Protection Services to the Startups:
It provides general advice on different Intellectual Property Rights to Startups.
It provides assistance in filing and disposal of the Intellectual Property applications related to Trademarks, patents, designs.
It provides assistance for inventions of Startups.
It prepares and files responses to examination reports and other notices, letters by the IP office.
It appears at hearing on behalf of the Startup.
It contests opposition by other parties.
It provides information on protection and promotion of IPR to Startups in other Countries.
These are the basic functions of Facilitators which they are bound to perform during their duty. The facilitators can be removed from the office by Controller General of Patent, Design, and Trademark (CGPDTM) if:
He receives any information about the professional misconduct of Facilitator.
He receives any complaint from the Startups.
Intellectual Property Rights are very important tool for a Business Organisation in achieving the success. It is the main reason why we should protect the IPR in Startups. Every Startup should have the knowledge of protecting the Intellectual property (Patent, Trademarks, and Designs etc). For the protection of Startup IP the Central Government had taken a good initiative by making the scheme for facilitating Startups IPR. For the effective enforcement of the scheme the Government appointed facilitator. These Facilitators provides the advice and assistance to Startups in protecting the Intellectual Property. They also provide awareness to the Startups to protect their Intellectual Property Rights. Overall this Scheme is objected to protect the Startups Intellectual Property Rights.
Intellectual Property Rights are very important asset for Startups in India and it is important to protect them by taking effective measures. Intellectual Property Rights are very effective tool for any Business Organisation to boost Industrial Competitiveness. Various business groups should focus to protect their IP (Intellectual Property) along with other important things. The Startup India Action Plan 2016 through the “Scheme for Facilitating Startups Intellectual Property Protection” promotes Intellectual Property Registration. The scheme for facilitating Startups Intellectual Property Protection is made to protect Patent, Trademarks and Designs of Startups.
Scheme for Facilitating Startups Intellectual Property protection (SIPP)
The scheme is released by the Office of Comptroller General of Patents Designs and Trademarks on 22nd April 2016 with the objective to protect and promote Intellectual Property Rights awareness for Startups in India. By this scheme the appointment of experienced and registered Trade Marks /patent Agents as Facilitator to guide and help the Startups in matters relating to protection of Intellectual Property. The Startups shall not have to pay any kind of fees for availing services from the Facilitators because they are directly paid by the Central Government. The Objective of this Scheme is to assist the Startups in protection and promotion of their Intellectual Property by providing good IP services. This Scheme is designed to promote awareness and adoption of Intellectual Property Rights.
Intellectual Property Facilitators
For the effective implementation of the scheme the Controller General of Patent, Trademark and Design appoint Facilitators to assist the Startups in protecting the Intellectual Property Rights. There is a list of persons who can be appointed as Facilitators:
Any Patent Agent registered with the Controller General of patent, Design, Trademark (CGPDTM)
Any Trademark Agent registered with the Controller General of Patent, Design, Trademark (CGPDTM)
Any Advocate as defined under The Advocates Act, 1961 who is actively involved in filing and disposal of applications for Patents, Trademarks and Designs.
Government Departments, Organisation, Agencies.
Functions of Facilitators
The functions of Facilitators are decided by the Controller General of Patent, Design, and Trademark (CGPDTM). The Facilitators provides following Intellectual Property Protection Services to the Startups:
It provides general advice on different Intellectual Property Rights to Startups.
It provides assistance in filing and disposal of the Intellectual Property applications related to Trademarks, patents, designs.
It provides assistance for inventions of Startups.
It prepares and files responses to examination reports and other notices, letters by the IP office.
It appears at hearing on behalf of the Startup.
It contests opposition by other parties.
It provides information on protection and promotion of IPR to Startups in other Countries.
These are the basic functions of Facilitators which they are bound to perform during their duty. The facilitators can be removed from the office by Controller General of Patent, Design, and Trademark (CGPDTM) if:
He receives any information about the professional misconduct of Facilitator.
He receives any complaint from the Startups.
Intellectual Property Rights are very important tool for a Business Organisation in achieving the success. It is the main reason why we should protect the IPR in Startups. Every Startup should have the knowledge of protecting the Intellectual property (Patent, Trademarks, and Designs etc). For the protection of Startup IP the Central Government had taken a good initiative by making the scheme for facilitating Startups IPR. For the effective enforcement of the scheme the Government appointed facilitator. These Facilitators provides the advice and assistance to Startups in protecting the Intellectual Property. They also provide awareness to the Startups to protect their Intellectual Property Rights. Overall this Scheme is objected to protect the Startups Intellectual Property Rights.
Patent Wars: Swords, Shields, Trophies, and Startups
BY KEVIN SANDLIN
Fortune 500 companies earn thousands of new patents every year, because they view patents as a measurement of “innovation.” It takes years and thousands of dollars to earn a patent, but earning a patent is just the beginning. The cost of maintaining each patent is not insignificant. Patent maintenance fees are due at three points following issuance: 3 ½ years; 7 ½ years; and 11 ½ years. Current patent maintenance fees total $8,710 per patent. Those fees are just the money patent-holders pay to the USPTO directly; however, the legal fees and administrative costs for patent maintenance are much higher. Are Fortune 500 (and other large enterprises) spending more on patent maintenance than they might spend to spin out and fund a startup based on an unused patent?
IBM Received 24 Patents PER DAY in 2016
As an example, we looked at the leader of leaders in earning patents, IBM, which has earned 89,594 patent awards in the last 20 years. We added up all the maintenance fees for the last 20 years of IBM’s patent dominance: $780 million! That number is an estimate (our math, not theirs) based on the last 20 years of IBM’s patent mastery, and assumes that IBM maintains all of its patents.
Where is All of this Innovation?
Most corporate patents fall into one of the following general categories:
Sword: Active, in market patent that is making money for the organization
Shield: Inactive patent that is preventing competition from gaining ground
Trophy: Inactive patent on a byproduct of R&D, sitting on the shelf
IBM and other Fortune 500 enterprises use their patents as either swords or shields. If one of big blue’s 89,594 patents is not a sword or a shield, it’s gathering dust on a shelf. Yet IBM is spending a large amount of money maintaining patents that they will never use. I say “large amount” because fewer than 2% of all patents ever get monetized. We understand why, and we’ve previously explained why enterprises like IBM don’t put money into every innovation they create. When you spend $6B per year on R&D, the innovations you take to market have to be multi-billion dollar innovations. Most patents are not billion dollar ideas.
Startup Spinouts Instead of Patent Maintenance
Instead of maintaining unused patents (and other latent, orphaned IP), what if IBM and other Fortune 500 enterprises performed the following annual exercise:
Evaluate the IP & Patent portfolio for items that are “non-core” to their business operations, meaning even if it were a billion dollar idea, it wouldn’t make sense for the company to get into that line of business.
Identify the five most interesting of these non-core patents, and spin them out as startups. By “interesting”, we mean that it solves a massive problem within a very large market and the potential audience is ready for such a solution.
Stop maintaining those patents that that are non-core and not in the top five.
Invest the cash that would have been spent maintaining unused patents into the five startups or into a fund that might capitalize future spin-outs.startups
Read More >> http://kevinsandlin.com/patent-wars/#content-wrapper
Fortune 500 companies earn thousands of new patents every year, because they view patents as a measurement of “innovation.” It takes years and thousands of dollars to earn a patent, but earning a patent is just the beginning. The cost of maintaining each patent is not insignificant. Patent maintenance fees are due at three points following issuance: 3 ½ years; 7 ½ years; and 11 ½ years. Current patent maintenance fees total $8,710 per patent. Those fees are just the money patent-holders pay to the USPTO directly; however, the legal fees and administrative costs for patent maintenance are much higher. Are Fortune 500 (and other large enterprises) spending more on patent maintenance than they might spend to spin out and fund a startup based on an unused patent?
IBM Received 24 Patents PER DAY in 2016
As an example, we looked at the leader of leaders in earning patents, IBM, which has earned 89,594 patent awards in the last 20 years. We added up all the maintenance fees for the last 20 years of IBM’s patent dominance: $780 million! That number is an estimate (our math, not theirs) based on the last 20 years of IBM’s patent mastery, and assumes that IBM maintains all of its patents.
Where is All of this Innovation?
Most corporate patents fall into one of the following general categories:
Sword: Active, in market patent that is making money for the organization
Shield: Inactive patent that is preventing competition from gaining ground
Trophy: Inactive patent on a byproduct of R&D, sitting on the shelf
IBM and other Fortune 500 enterprises use their patents as either swords or shields. If one of big blue’s 89,594 patents is not a sword or a shield, it’s gathering dust on a shelf. Yet IBM is spending a large amount of money maintaining patents that they will never use. I say “large amount” because fewer than 2% of all patents ever get monetized. We understand why, and we’ve previously explained why enterprises like IBM don’t put money into every innovation they create. When you spend $6B per year on R&D, the innovations you take to market have to be multi-billion dollar innovations. Most patents are not billion dollar ideas.
Startup Spinouts Instead of Patent Maintenance
Instead of maintaining unused patents (and other latent, orphaned IP), what if IBM and other Fortune 500 enterprises performed the following annual exercise:
Evaluate the IP & Patent portfolio for items that are “non-core” to their business operations, meaning even if it were a billion dollar idea, it wouldn’t make sense for the company to get into that line of business.
Identify the five most interesting of these non-core patents, and spin them out as startups. By “interesting”, we mean that it solves a massive problem within a very large market and the potential audience is ready for such a solution.
Stop maintaining those patents that that are non-core and not in the top five.
Invest the cash that would have been spent maintaining unused patents into the five startups or into a fund that might capitalize future spin-outs.startups
Read More >> http://kevinsandlin.com/patent-wars/#content-wrapper
The Role of Trademark Law in the History of US Visual Identity Design, c.1860–1960
By Oxford University Press on behalf of The Design History Society
Introduction
Design historians still await a truly authoritative account of the development of visual identity design (aka graphic identity design or corporate identity design1) in the United States. Historians of visual identity design still disagree on basic matters of fact, such as when visual identity design was first practised in the USA, and which US designers and companies were the first to engage in it. There is, as yet, no widely accepted explanation as to why so few US businesses commissioned visual identity designs prior to World War II, nor why a small but significant number of US businesses simultaneously decided to do so in the mid-1930s (as opposed to at some earlier or later historical moment). Moreover, many historians have relied on highly dubious assertions about the character of US designers and businesses in order to explain the post-war surge of interest in visual identity design.
In this essay, I argue that US trademark law has played an under-recognized but formative role in the early history of US visual identity design. For example, design historians have seldom offered explanations for why US businesspeople did not commission visual identity designs in the 1900s, 1910s and 1920s; the few who have done, have suggested that US businesspeople’s ignorance, or their ‘conservative tastes’, were the reason for their lack of interest in them. In contrast, I argue that US trademark law during those decades strongly favoured ‘conservative’ styles and furthermore made visual identity design a risky and in some cases actively undesirable investment. Second, earlier design historians have offered changing tastes or an increasing acceptance of modernism as reasons why a small but significant minority of US businesses simultaneously commissioned the country’s first visual identity designs in the mid-1930s. I propose instead that changes in US common law pertaining to trademark licensing and franchising, coupled with anti-chain legislation, made visual identity design feasible and desirable for the first time, and indeed downright necessary for certain kinds of franchises. Third, earlier design historians have credited the efforts of individual designers with strong personal visions, the changing size and character of US corporations and, once again, changing tastes as explanations for why nearly every large regional, national and multinational US company invested in visual identity design following World War II. In contrast, I argue that the strong statutory trademark protection afforded by the Lanham Act of 1946 sparked the strong and sustained surge of interest of businesses in visual identity design. And ultimately, I suggest that attending to the laws that condition the actions of all businesses and designers can at times yield more satisfying historical explanations than traditional archival research on individual businesses or designers.
How US common law shaped nineteenth-century trademark design
Today, legal scholars routinely lump trademark law together with copyright, patent, and design patent law as a form of so-called intellectual property law.2 But trademarks are far more ancient than patents and copyrights, and spring from entirely different motives. Patents and copyrights are intended to provide incentives to innovation by granting inventors and creators a limited-term, exclusive right to produce their novel inventions or original creative works. Trademarks provide no incentives to create new goods, nor exclusive rights to produce goods. Because their original purpose was simply to identify the source of goods, they can endure under both common and statutory law for as long as a producer remains in operation.
Producers, consumers, and governing bodies all have reasons to be interested in trademarks. Producers have, for millennia, voluntarily moulded, stamped, incised and painted their names or makers’ marks on their products in order to solicit repeat custom and to deter copyists. Consumers use trademarks to identify goods by makers whose products they have liked in the past. Civil and religious authorities have often mandated printers’ marks, just as guilds often required trademarks and hallmarks, in order to regulate the number of authorized producers and to punish those whose output they deemed sacrilegious, unethical or incompetent.
The authors of the Constitution did not explicitly authorize Congress to write federal trademark legislation, presumably because there were no precedents and no recognized need for it. Until 1870, the US states individually adjudicated trademark and unfair competition disputes under common law. Under state common law, the person or business who could demonstrate the earliest continuous use of a trademark in a given field of commerce in a given state received exclusive rights to the mark in that state. But since the purpose of trademarks is to identify the source of goods, another bedrock principle of nineteenth-century US common law was that people could not be precluded from doing business under their own names. And indeed, the vast majority of early and mid-nineteenth-century American businesses used their founders’ names as, or as part of, their trademarks (e.g., Procter & Gamble; F.W. Woolworth’s; Montgomery Ward, J.C. Penney, Levi-Strauss, Smith Brothers).
Read Moer >> https://academic.oup.com/jdh/article/30/4/371/4057680
Introduction
Design historians still await a truly authoritative account of the development of visual identity design (aka graphic identity design or corporate identity design1) in the United States. Historians of visual identity design still disagree on basic matters of fact, such as when visual identity design was first practised in the USA, and which US designers and companies were the first to engage in it. There is, as yet, no widely accepted explanation as to why so few US businesses commissioned visual identity designs prior to World War II, nor why a small but significant number of US businesses simultaneously decided to do so in the mid-1930s (as opposed to at some earlier or later historical moment). Moreover, many historians have relied on highly dubious assertions about the character of US designers and businesses in order to explain the post-war surge of interest in visual identity design.
In this essay, I argue that US trademark law has played an under-recognized but formative role in the early history of US visual identity design. For example, design historians have seldom offered explanations for why US businesspeople did not commission visual identity designs in the 1900s, 1910s and 1920s; the few who have done, have suggested that US businesspeople’s ignorance, or their ‘conservative tastes’, were the reason for their lack of interest in them. In contrast, I argue that US trademark law during those decades strongly favoured ‘conservative’ styles and furthermore made visual identity design a risky and in some cases actively undesirable investment. Second, earlier design historians have offered changing tastes or an increasing acceptance of modernism as reasons why a small but significant minority of US businesses simultaneously commissioned the country’s first visual identity designs in the mid-1930s. I propose instead that changes in US common law pertaining to trademark licensing and franchising, coupled with anti-chain legislation, made visual identity design feasible and desirable for the first time, and indeed downright necessary for certain kinds of franchises. Third, earlier design historians have credited the efforts of individual designers with strong personal visions, the changing size and character of US corporations and, once again, changing tastes as explanations for why nearly every large regional, national and multinational US company invested in visual identity design following World War II. In contrast, I argue that the strong statutory trademark protection afforded by the Lanham Act of 1946 sparked the strong and sustained surge of interest of businesses in visual identity design. And ultimately, I suggest that attending to the laws that condition the actions of all businesses and designers can at times yield more satisfying historical explanations than traditional archival research on individual businesses or designers.
How US common law shaped nineteenth-century trademark design
Today, legal scholars routinely lump trademark law together with copyright, patent, and design patent law as a form of so-called intellectual property law.2 But trademarks are far more ancient than patents and copyrights, and spring from entirely different motives. Patents and copyrights are intended to provide incentives to innovation by granting inventors and creators a limited-term, exclusive right to produce their novel inventions or original creative works. Trademarks provide no incentives to create new goods, nor exclusive rights to produce goods. Because their original purpose was simply to identify the source of goods, they can endure under both common and statutory law for as long as a producer remains in operation.
Producers, consumers, and governing bodies all have reasons to be interested in trademarks. Producers have, for millennia, voluntarily moulded, stamped, incised and painted their names or makers’ marks on their products in order to solicit repeat custom and to deter copyists. Consumers use trademarks to identify goods by makers whose products they have liked in the past. Civil and religious authorities have often mandated printers’ marks, just as guilds often required trademarks and hallmarks, in order to regulate the number of authorized producers and to punish those whose output they deemed sacrilegious, unethical or incompetent.
The authors of the Constitution did not explicitly authorize Congress to write federal trademark legislation, presumably because there were no precedents and no recognized need for it. Until 1870, the US states individually adjudicated trademark and unfair competition disputes under common law. Under state common law, the person or business who could demonstrate the earliest continuous use of a trademark in a given field of commerce in a given state received exclusive rights to the mark in that state. But since the purpose of trademarks is to identify the source of goods, another bedrock principle of nineteenth-century US common law was that people could not be precluded from doing business under their own names. And indeed, the vast majority of early and mid-nineteenth-century American businesses used their founders’ names as, or as part of, their trademarks (e.g., Procter & Gamble; F.W. Woolworth’s; Montgomery Ward, J.C. Penney, Levi-Strauss, Smith Brothers).
Read Moer >> https://academic.oup.com/jdh/article/30/4/371/4057680
A NEW STARTUP BUSINESS: WHAT IS NEEDED FOR SUCCESS
By Michael J Foycik Jr.
So you're starting a new business, congratulations! The sky's the limit. If your new startup business is based on a new idea, a new concept, or a new invention, then you'll need something first.
What will you need for success? At least one thing: something unique that you own. The key word here is “own” and that includes intellectual property: patent rights, trademark rights, copyright rights, and trade secret rights. Otherwise, your initial success can be copied or taken by anyone.
You should have a pending application of some type. That is, unless you already have an issued patent or a registered trademark, though a startup is unlikely to have either one. What you can have is a pending application: a pending patent application, a pending trademark application, or both. For some businesses, a copyright application is needed instead of, or in addition to, a patent application.
A pending application documents ownership, as of the filing date. For patent applications, the law now is first-to-file. If you wait to file a patent application, anyone can take your idea and file on it. So be the first! If you are first, then your rights are documented by the filing of the application.
Costs can be kept fairly low on the patent side by filing a provisional patent application (PPA), which gives true patent pending rights for one year, which can give priority rights for any later filed utility patent application. The PPA also documents trade secret rights when the subject matter is kept confidential, and such rights can be valuable.
A pending federal trademark application also documents rights. What's in a name? Sometimes an entire business depends on a catchy name. Even if there are no other types of rights, just having trademark rights can mean success. Even a pending trademark application can be valuable!
Investors look for rights of some type. Pending rights are just fine in most cases. Otherwise, what are the investors getting for their money? This is typically also true for crowd funding. If you own nothing, your and your investors may end up with nothing.
Finally, if possible, consult an IP attorney early.
So you're starting a new business, congratulations! The sky's the limit. If your new startup business is based on a new idea, a new concept, or a new invention, then you'll need something first.
What will you need for success? At least one thing: something unique that you own. The key word here is “own” and that includes intellectual property: patent rights, trademark rights, copyright rights, and trade secret rights. Otherwise, your initial success can be copied or taken by anyone.
You should have a pending application of some type. That is, unless you already have an issued patent or a registered trademark, though a startup is unlikely to have either one. What you can have is a pending application: a pending patent application, a pending trademark application, or both. For some businesses, a copyright application is needed instead of, or in addition to, a patent application.
A pending application documents ownership, as of the filing date. For patent applications, the law now is first-to-file. If you wait to file a patent application, anyone can take your idea and file on it. So be the first! If you are first, then your rights are documented by the filing of the application.
Costs can be kept fairly low on the patent side by filing a provisional patent application (PPA), which gives true patent pending rights for one year, which can give priority rights for any later filed utility patent application. The PPA also documents trade secret rights when the subject matter is kept confidential, and such rights can be valuable.
A pending federal trademark application also documents rights. What's in a name? Sometimes an entire business depends on a catchy name. Even if there are no other types of rights, just having trademark rights can mean success. Even a pending trademark application can be valuable!
Investors look for rights of some type. Pending rights are just fine in most cases. Otherwise, what are the investors getting for their money? This is typically also true for crowd funding. If you own nothing, your and your investors may end up with nothing.
Finally, if possible, consult an IP attorney early.
Pick the Right Intellectual Property Law Program
By Ilana Kowarski, Reporter
Intellectual property plays a critical role in American life. According to a U.S. Patent and Trademark Office report, IP industries account for more than 38 percent of the gross domestic product.
It's no surprise then that intellectual property law – which protects people's ownership claims to their ideas, inventions and works of art – is a growing field.
Intellectual property attorneys say their skills are in demand, and experts note there are opportunities to practice IP law within any industry that involves human creativity. This means a wide array of commercial legal jobs, particularly in the rapidly expanding high-tech sector, and jobs that involve international litigation to resolve the significant number of disputes between U.S. and international companies.
[Discover what a typical day is like for an intellectual property attorney.]
This legal field is likewise becoming more central to important U.S. policy disputes, IP attorneys say. Jon Kappes, a patent lawyer and lecturer at Arizona State University's Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law, says "IP law, particularly patent law but also copyright and trademark, has in recent years become one of the most dynamic areas of the law."
Kappes says congressional members regularly propose revisions to the nation's IP laws, and there are a growing number of Supreme Court cases on this topic.
For law school hopefuls who enjoy science, art or entertainment, experts say this discipline may be an attractive option. IP law is also essential for future business attorneys to fully understand, since patents, copyrights, trade secrets and trademarks are invaluable to businesses.
[Consider a legal career focusing on either health care or intellectual property.]
"If students are interested in sort of a rapidly changing, cutting-edge area of practice, I can’t think of one that is evolving at the rate of intellectual property," he says.
Experts say that law schools vary in how well they prepare students to practice IP law. Here are three signs of a strong intellectual property law program.
Trademark Attorney | "Federal trademark official part of iHub seminar"
By : Loralee Stevens
Source : http://www.northbaybusinessjournal.com
Category : Trademark Attorney
If you’ve ever wondered about trademarks, how to get and protect them, there’s a free seminar tomorrow at the iHub in Rohnert Park.
Craig Morris, an expert in the field and long-time employee of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, is flying out from Washington, D.C., to lead the panel.
“The USPTO just recently launched the public outreach program,” said Santa Rosa patent attorney Warren Dranit, who arranged the seminar. “There are lots of complicated issues around trademarks and the registration process, such as picking one that won’t get you sued.”
U.S. trademarks are different than patents and copyrights, and successfully defending one is largely a matter of choosing the right one to start with, he said.
In addition to Mr. Morris’s discussion, San Francisco intellectual property attorney Carole Barrett will be on hand to talk about international trademarks, which are obtained and defended differently.
Registering a trademark in the U.S. usually costs about $325 per category, or class, according to Mr. Dranit.
“If you choose a trademark for wine, that’s one class. But if your trademark also covers beer the registration fee is doubled to $650, or less if certain patent office guidelines are followed,” he said.
The seminar will cover how to choose a strong, legally defensible trademark, whether an attorney is needed for the registration process and how to select one, how to avoid trademark scams and what to do if you receive a “cease and desist” letter, among other issues.
Source : http://www.northbaybusinessjournal.com/65062/federal-trademark-official-part-of-ihub-seminar/
Source : http://www.northbaybusinessjournal.com
Category : Trademark Attorney
If you’ve ever wondered about trademarks, how to get and protect them, there’s a free seminar tomorrow at the iHub in Rohnert Park.
Craig Morris, an expert in the field and long-time employee of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, is flying out from Washington, D.C., to lead the panel.
“The USPTO just recently launched the public outreach program,” said Santa Rosa patent attorney Warren Dranit, who arranged the seminar. “There are lots of complicated issues around trademarks and the registration process, such as picking one that won’t get you sued.”
U.S. trademarks are different than patents and copyrights, and successfully defending one is largely a matter of choosing the right one to start with, he said.
In addition to Mr. Morris’s discussion, San Francisco intellectual property attorney Carole Barrett will be on hand to talk about international trademarks, which are obtained and defended differently.
Registering a trademark in the U.S. usually costs about $325 per category, or class, according to Mr. Dranit.
“If you choose a trademark for wine, that’s one class. But if your trademark also covers beer the registration fee is doubled to $650, or less if certain patent office guidelines are followed,” he said.
The seminar will cover how to choose a strong, legally defensible trademark, whether an attorney is needed for the registration process and how to select one, how to avoid trademark scams and what to do if you receive a “cease and desist” letter, among other issues.
Source : http://www.northbaybusinessjournal.com/65062/federal-trademark-official-part-of-ihub-seminar/
US Trademark Application | "Protect your rights before you outsource "
By : Arlene Soto
Source : http://theworldlink.com
Category : US Trademark Application
Q: Do I need to patent my invention before having it manufactured in China?
A: U.S. patent and trademark protection, also called intellectual property rights, covers your invention only in the United States. The Small Business Administration (SBA) www.sba.gov, recommends working with legal counsel to develop an overall intellectual property rights strategy. This strategy should include developing language for licensing and subcontracting, conducting due diligence of potential foreign partners, registering intellectual property rights in key foreign markets and recording patents, trademarks and copyrights with Customs and Border Patrol www.cbp.gov. This process may be costly, so it's a good idea to identify the potential target market and overall sales potential as a part of the business plan you create. You also will need to be aware of any restrictions on importing your products back into the U.S. There are many hurdles to overcome prior to making the decision to manufacture outside the United States.
Small businesses are even more vulnerable to theft of intellectual property than large businesses because most lack the resources to catch and repair problems if they occur. A patent gives you the right to defend if someone else infringes on that patent and steals your idea. Without money and time, it's difficult to catch and prosecute the person who tries to steal your idea in the U.S. and it's even more expensive and difficult in a foreign country. The World Customs Organization, www.wcoomd.org, estimates counterfeiting accounts for 5 percent to 7 percent of global merchandise trade, costing U.S. businesses billions of dollars each year. Good information about protecting intellectual property rights outside the United States is available at www.stopfakes.gov. This site also can be used to report theft of intellectual property rights.
A good resource for inventors in our area is the South Coast Inventors Group that meets at 6:30 p.m.the first Wednesday of each month at The Business Center, 2455 Maple Leaf, North Bend. For more information about attending a meeting ,contact the Southwestern Oregon Business Development Center at 541-756-6866 or go to www.BizCenter.org. The Inventors Group would be able to provide insights into resources available for inventors, ideas about protecting your intellectual property rights and even some ideas for manufacturing and distributing your products.
Before making the decision to manufacture your invention in China or another foreign country, be sure to talk with an attorney experienced in intellectual property rights and international trade. You will also want to work with someone well versed in trade issues with the country you will be manufacturing in. Then make sure your business plan is up to date with the overall strategy you plan to use to protect and market your invention including all potential costs and benefits of the decision you make.
Source : http://theworldlink.com/business/protect-your-rights-before-you-outsource/article_6eba6e2f-0af0-55ff-a095-a8d21f73d4ee.html
Source : http://theworldlink.com
Category : US Trademark Application
Q: Do I need to patent my invention before having it manufactured in China?
A: U.S. patent and trademark protection, also called intellectual property rights, covers your invention only in the United States. The Small Business Administration (SBA) www.sba.gov, recommends working with legal counsel to develop an overall intellectual property rights strategy. This strategy should include developing language for licensing and subcontracting, conducting due diligence of potential foreign partners, registering intellectual property rights in key foreign markets and recording patents, trademarks and copyrights with Customs and Border Patrol www.cbp.gov. This process may be costly, so it's a good idea to identify the potential target market and overall sales potential as a part of the business plan you create. You also will need to be aware of any restrictions on importing your products back into the U.S. There are many hurdles to overcome prior to making the decision to manufacture outside the United States.
Small businesses are even more vulnerable to theft of intellectual property than large businesses because most lack the resources to catch and repair problems if they occur. A patent gives you the right to defend if someone else infringes on that patent and steals your idea. Without money and time, it's difficult to catch and prosecute the person who tries to steal your idea in the U.S. and it's even more expensive and difficult in a foreign country. The World Customs Organization, www.wcoomd.org, estimates counterfeiting accounts for 5 percent to 7 percent of global merchandise trade, costing U.S. businesses billions of dollars each year. Good information about protecting intellectual property rights outside the United States is available at www.stopfakes.gov. This site also can be used to report theft of intellectual property rights.
A good resource for inventors in our area is the South Coast Inventors Group that meets at 6:30 p.m.the first Wednesday of each month at The Business Center, 2455 Maple Leaf, North Bend. For more information about attending a meeting ,contact the Southwestern Oregon Business Development Center at 541-756-6866 or go to www.BizCenter.org. The Inventors Group would be able to provide insights into resources available for inventors, ideas about protecting your intellectual property rights and even some ideas for manufacturing and distributing your products.
Before making the decision to manufacture your invention in China or another foreign country, be sure to talk with an attorney experienced in intellectual property rights and international trade. You will also want to work with someone well versed in trade issues with the country you will be manufacturing in. Then make sure your business plan is up to date with the overall strategy you plan to use to protect and market your invention including all potential costs and benefits of the decision you make.
Source : http://theworldlink.com/business/protect-your-rights-before-you-outsource/article_6eba6e2f-0af0-55ff-a095-a8d21f73d4ee.html
Trademark Application | "Business Owners Need to be Vigilant in Protecting Their Domain Names"
By : Cox Padmore Skolnik & Shakarchy
Source : http://www.digitaljournal.com
Category : Trademark Application
Complex legal disputes can arise when one business registers a particular domain name and another business subsequently attempts to obtain a trademark in the same words.
In today's tech age, you can scarcely find a business that doesn't have some type of online presence. In fact, many "stores" are almost exclusively found online - such as Amazon.com. Consequently, many traditional "brick and mortar" stores are finding themselves on the losing end of a battle between themselves and their online counterparts, given that online stores have much lower overhead costs.
In an effort to take part in this technological revolution, business owners routinely register new domain names in order to protect their spot on the internet. Many business owners believe - often mistakenly - that simply registering this domain name provides them some trademark protection in the domain name. This assumption can prove costly to a business owner as trademark litigation is likely to occur if they believe simply registering a domain is the same as a trademark.
Domain names and trademark priority
Disputes can arise when one business registers a particular domain name and another business subsequently attempts to obtain a trademark in the same words. Obviously, the company owning the domain name would like to object to the trademark application of the second company and protect its "rights" in the domain name. However, the first company can only protect the domain name, and stop the second company from registering the trademark, if it can show it has priority in the mark - meaning it "used" the mark first.
Unfortunately, this question has yet to be expressly determined in the Second Circuit, but other circuits and Patent and Trademark Office decisions have concluded that simply registering a domain does not create trademark rights. In fact, an often cited Ninth Circuit decision - Brookfield Communications v. West Coast Entertainment- has expressly stated that registration of a domain name does not by itself constitute "use" for the purpose of establishing trademark priority, even if the company intends to eventually use the domain commercially.
This particular proposition was also recently recognized in an Arizona federal case in which a company had registered a domain name but still hadn't created a website - the domain name was simply used as a "splash page" filled with third-party advertisements.
Companies cannot make the mistake of not actually using a registered domain name. Ultimately, a domain name does not become a trademark unless it is also being used to identify and distinguish a particular source of services or goods.
Seek help
The law surrounding domain names and trademark rights is quite complex and difficult to navigate. Even the slightest change in circumstances can determine whether or not a company actually has a protectable interest in a mark. If you are a business owner and you believe another company is using your intellectual property without your permission, or if you want to object to another company's application for a trademark, contact an experienced trademark litigation attorney to be advised of your rights and options.
Source : http://www.digitaljournal.com/pr/955998
Source : http://www.digitaljournal.com
Category : Trademark Application
Complex legal disputes can arise when one business registers a particular domain name and another business subsequently attempts to obtain a trademark in the same words.
In today's tech age, you can scarcely find a business that doesn't have some type of online presence. In fact, many "stores" are almost exclusively found online - such as Amazon.com. Consequently, many traditional "brick and mortar" stores are finding themselves on the losing end of a battle between themselves and their online counterparts, given that online stores have much lower overhead costs.
In an effort to take part in this technological revolution, business owners routinely register new domain names in order to protect their spot on the internet. Many business owners believe - often mistakenly - that simply registering this domain name provides them some trademark protection in the domain name. This assumption can prove costly to a business owner as trademark litigation is likely to occur if they believe simply registering a domain is the same as a trademark.
Domain names and trademark priority
Disputes can arise when one business registers a particular domain name and another business subsequently attempts to obtain a trademark in the same words. Obviously, the company owning the domain name would like to object to the trademark application of the second company and protect its "rights" in the domain name. However, the first company can only protect the domain name, and stop the second company from registering the trademark, if it can show it has priority in the mark - meaning it "used" the mark first.
Unfortunately, this question has yet to be expressly determined in the Second Circuit, but other circuits and Patent and Trademark Office decisions have concluded that simply registering a domain does not create trademark rights. In fact, an often cited Ninth Circuit decision - Brookfield Communications v. West Coast Entertainment- has expressly stated that registration of a domain name does not by itself constitute "use" for the purpose of establishing trademark priority, even if the company intends to eventually use the domain commercially.
This particular proposition was also recently recognized in an Arizona federal case in which a company had registered a domain name but still hadn't created a website - the domain name was simply used as a "splash page" filled with third-party advertisements.
Companies cannot make the mistake of not actually using a registered domain name. Ultimately, a domain name does not become a trademark unless it is also being used to identify and distinguish a particular source of services or goods.
Seek help
The law surrounding domain names and trademark rights is quite complex and difficult to navigate. Even the slightest change in circumstances can determine whether or not a company actually has a protectable interest in a mark. If you are a business owner and you believe another company is using your intellectual property without your permission, or if you want to object to another company's application for a trademark, contact an experienced trademark litigation attorney to be advised of your rights and options.
Source : http://www.digitaljournal.com/pr/955998
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