Bringing an offering such as a product or service into marketplace is a substantial business accomplishment. Making that accomplishment profitable however requires commercialization and launch planning. Commercialization and launch are…
There are two primary options for protecting an invention or process: obtain a patent and/or keep it a trade secret. Patent and trade secret protection for the same aspect of…
A product clearance opinion (or freedom to operate opinion) analyses if a product or operation infringes on enforceable patents in a terri- tory or country of interest. As patent laws…
There are generally two types of trademark applications in the U.S. Trade- mark Office. In-Use and Intent-To-Use (ITU). An In-Use application is based on current use of a mark in…
Design patents protect how something looks whereas utility patents protect how something works. Design patents protect ornamental features of an invention, not its function. Utility patents protect the functional features…
A “preissuance submission†is a procedure by which a third party submits published material to the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) as a claim of prior art against…
The USPTO has a number of different programs to allow for speedier prosecution of patent applications. Each expedited prosecution path has their own qualifications, advantages, and disadvantages. This series of…
The previous post in this series covered Track One prioritized examination, a USPTO program with a substantial fee, but no additional preparation required for the application. This post details a…
The Full First Action Interview (FAI) Pilot Program allows a participating applicant to request a first action interview with a patent examiner prior to the first office action on the…
The Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) is a program applicable to inventors filing applications for a single invention in multiple nations or jurisdictions. When one or more claims on one such…
