Heather in Savannah Posted June 9, 2009 Share Posted June 9, 2009 (edited) My dh has come up with an invention.....great! How complex is the process? The US Patent Office website recommends hiring an attorney or agent, did you do that? Were you successful at getting your patent approved? I feel like we need some perspective on this. Dh is in the engineering field and his strength is not in the business side. I suspect applying for and obtaining a patent is a much lengthier and more costly process than it would appear on the surface. If you prefer to do this off line, please pm me. Gratefully, Heather Edited June 9, 2009 by Heather in Savannah Remove some problem wording Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TwinMominTX Posted June 9, 2009 Share Posted June 9, 2009 My husband has several issued patents, two patents waiting to be issued and about a ten rejected patents. My best advice is to search the patent website to make sure it isn't already been covered. Do as much of this work yourself up front. If you hire an attorney to do it for you it will be $$ (of course). My husand has always used a patent attorney. Sometimes (depending on the patent's perceived value) a patent attorney will take your case on a contingency fee - meaning they would get a percentage of its value when sold. This is very very rare and is generally only done when someone has an existing relationship with the patent attorney or has already established means of marketing the patent (think IBM or someone like that). My husband has a patent very near issuing - within two weeks or so. Right now we are probably into the attorney about $10,000. It's been paid over about 6 years, but it isn't cheap. Some patents we've paid more and some less. Good luck! Make sure you get signed non-disclosure agreements from anyone he shows or tells about his patent idea. Not protecting the idea is one of the major claims the patent office uses to reject patents. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dirty ethel rackham Posted June 9, 2009 Share Posted June 9, 2009 I haven't done this myself, but our science club did a unit on inventions and we had a local inventor come out about a month ago and describe what she went through. This inventor WHOLEHEARTEDLY recommended a patent attorney. She said that there is no way she would have been able to make her way through the entire patent process without one. Also, she made the very expensive mistake of not hiring a trademark attorney and had her trademark application denied because she did not find a similar trademark. She ended up having to spend a significant amount of money to scrap her product packaging and start over. I am sure that there are books and message boards devoted to the subject. It can take several years to go through the process. This woman had absolutely no business background and is now successfully marketing her game. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RegGuheert Posted June 9, 2009 Share Posted June 9, 2009 I won't go into details, but I will say the patent that I currently have pending is ALMOST UNREADABLE TO ME. I am the inventor, so you would think I would be able to understand the patent application. Hardly! Once the lawyers turn your idea into something other lawyers can understand, it becomes quite foreign to an engineer. There's a lot about the process that I find frustrating. I can recommend a patent attorney, if you would like. If nothing else, he can explain his fees and the process to you. Reg P.S. My apologies to all the lawyers out there...even if you do this type of obfuscation ON PURPOSE! ;) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heather in Savannah Posted June 9, 2009 Author Share Posted June 9, 2009 The more information I can pass on to my dh the better. How much money did you spend(legals & gov't fees) to get to the point of knowing if your application was accepted or rejected? How long is that process? Thanks, Heather Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rosie_0801 Posted June 9, 2009 Share Posted June 9, 2009 No advice, but plenty of good wishes! A friend of my mother's spent thousands and eventually it got so expensive she had to give up. I don't suppose I'll ever find out what the invention was now. You live the US, so maybe the process won't be as bad as it was for her. :grouphug: Rosie Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
creekland Posted June 9, 2009 Share Posted June 9, 2009 Hubby did one 100% on his own without any issues at all. He's an engineer, so could do the drawings and the technical writing, etc. There was a book he used - and a web site for inventors (real inventors, not corporations, etc.). He couldn't understand why anyone would pay for an attorney... That said, since HE did it, I don't recall a lot of the other details... and he's at a meeting now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TravelingChris Posted June 10, 2009 Share Posted June 10, 2009 WE have two patent office workers at our church and we were talking to one how to get a patent. The searches are very hard, according to him, since you not only have to search the US but also all the countries. If you don't know Japanese, for instance, you may not find it. He says that almost all patents are rejected the first time and you need either a patent attorney or a patent agent to help you write up the invention in the way they want and get it argued through. WE are going to think about it later since dh is about to go on another three week trip and I told him I want him first to start searching the patent office computers on his lunch hour. THey are in Alexandria VA. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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