Anyone know any patent lawyers? Might have had an original idea and have no clue how the process works.
Hannah
I have worked with Parker Justiss several times over the years and have been pleased with their work everytime.
Most often the first step is to file a provisional patent. The governent’s filing fee is $75. The provisional establishes your date of filing. This gives you one year to file for the actual patent called a non-provisional patent.
Before meeting with a patent attorney, it is a good idea to do the 5 things mentioned in this video:
The 5 items will help you develop your thoughts and ideas. It will also make the conversation with the patent attorney go smoother (since they will ask for these things too.).
Finally, before discussing your idea with anyone, it is best to ask them to sign a confidentiality agreement.
Feel free to message me if you have any questions.
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Lots of good suggestions here.
@Humegirl - you should also go online and do a patent search (and patent application search) to see if someone has already patented your idea. Might save you a bunch of $$.
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US Patent Search site:
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Thank you for the suggestion and all the info. I will definitely look into this!
Didn’t know I could do that without a lawyer. Thanks!
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The book, “Patent it Yourself” contains lots of good information on the process even if your intention isn’t to actually patent it yourself.
Not to discourage your pursuit of a patent and not knowing anything about your idea, I will say that for a “little guy” a patent is often pretty useless. It might be valuable if you are looking to license or sell your idea to a bigger entity, but as far as using it to actually keep someone from “stealing” your idea, know that patent litigation pretty much starts with a 7-figure price tag. It could be useful to scare off a small competitor or get a product removed from a marketplace like Amazon. Hopefully the attorney you consult is honest enough to discuss all of this with you.
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This is exactly why I haven’t bothered patenting items. You have to have the money to defend it.
We do have several patent attorneys at the space, however I will not name them unless they choose to themselves.
I do know a guys who did successfully get a patent the first shot, by himself (DIY). He had a patent attorney as a friend, his friend was surprised that he got it the first time. It was explained that it normally took 2-3 tries at times to get it.
I will echo Matt’s sentiments. Don’t let that dissuade you from trying, if that is what you want to do.
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Forgot to add. My friend who got that patent also patented everything around his design that didn’t work. This was so companies couldn’t get even close to his design without encroaching on his design.
Food for thought.
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A strong Patent title may be hard and expensive to get. I have 10 patents with Texas Instruments, all dealing with the early days of digital television. Just the title of my one Patent was in litigation for over 2 years. The concept was immediately approved, we just had to litigate the title. Check out US Patent # 5,526,051 - “Digital Television System”. This was the very first all digital television. The Patent Office kept stating that the title was too generic. We stated that there was a Patent entitled “Analog Television System”, but ours was all digital. With the financial backing of many corporate patent lawyers we were able to fight it and succeed. Now as a result, any patent search dealing with digital aspects of television, including HDTV, will bring up this patent for consideration.
Richard Meyer
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When I filed my patent application, I used Solidworks to generate the line drawings / patent drawings / patent illustrations. Those can otherwise get pricey if a third party generates them.
The company behind Solidworks gives DMS members a limited number of free licenses. Read this if interested:
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