Not necessarily. A patent gives the owner the right to exclude others from practicing (making, using or selling) the invention and is a tangible asset. Its value depends a great deal on the scope of the claims of patent and the likely length of the invention's life. Alternate ways of extracting value from an invention are trademarks and trade secrets which are also considred tangible assets.
A trade secret is a method or recipe which is not public information. The advantage of a trade secret over a patent is that a trade secret can (theoretically) last forever, while a patent has a statuatory life span. However, a license for a trade secret generally runs for as long as the art is useful and remains a secret. It is harder to write and enforce a license for a trade secret than one for a patent; thus, trade secrets are often sold outright, rather than for a royalty stream.
A copyright and trademark can last forever and in some cases may be more valuable than any patent. However, they are only as valuable as their public recognition, so trademarks of start-up operations may not have much current value. Any trademarks and copyrights related to an invention are generally transferred along with the patents as part of a comprehensive agreement. It is possible to arrange for continued payment of royalties for the use of the trademark and copyright, even after the patents expire, but this is uncommon.
There are three kinds of patents, provisional, utility and design.
A provisional patent is not really a patent as such but is a way for an inventor to establish the priority of the inventor's ideas prior to actually filing a patent. International patent law awards a patent to the first person to file a patent, while U.S. law awards a patent to the first person who conceives of and enables the invention. The problem with the International law is that it can take a long time from the conception of an invention to the filing of a formal application which gives the inventor priority, and if another inventor files first, you can lose your patent rights. A provisional patent bridges this gap. For a small fee, an inventor (without the need for a patent attorney) can give the salient features of the invention to the patent office by means of the provisional patent application, which establishes the priority of the invention for up to 12 month following the filing of the provisional patent. A provisional patent also allows the inventor to claim "patent pending" status for the invention. Remember that the information given in the provisional patent should be as complete as possible. Priority cannot be given to elements of an invention which were not disclosed in the provisional patent application.
A utility patent is the name used for a patent which covers the principles of an apparatus or a method, or a formula. It is what is usually thought of when one refers to a "patent".
A design patent only covers the exact look of a device. In this sense, it is similar to a trademark, except that the life of a design patent is only fourteen years. A design patent offers only a small degree of protection.
One of the basic mistakes made by both inventors and many patent attorneys is that too much material is disclosed in the patent. The rule is that there must be enough information in the patent specification so that someone "skilled in the art" can practice the invention. This means that all novel and important aspects of the invention must be present or the patent could be later declared invalid. This does not mean, however, that everything you know and every experiment that you performed should be included. Only the least amount of information necessary should be given, since this results in the clearest patent. Besides the basic information about the invention, there is also a requirement that you disclose the "preferred embodiment", which is what the inventor believes is the best way to practice the invention. This does not mean the best way that it can ever be practiced, just the best way that you believe it can be practiced at the time the application is filed.
Although a patent is supposed to be written for someone "skilled in the art", it really should be also be written for the hypothetical judge and jury who may read your patent and decide whether or not it is being infringed. Without meaning to disparage any members of our judicial system, this effectively means that an eighth-grader should be able to get the gist of the invention by reading the patent, so make sure that at least part of the patent specification is a concise description of the invention, what it does, and why it is better than what was done before, and keep any jargon to a minimum.
Actually, you don't. The patent office will accept an application for, and issue a patent without any proof of its effectiveness. However, if the invention doesn't work as described, the patent would be invalid, so you should be pretty sure it works before filing. Filing before sure knowledge of whether an invention will work was more commonly done before the availability of provisional patents. It is better, and much less expensive, to file a provisional patent, which gives you a year to determine the invention's value. In the case of inventions which will require a substantial investment before feasability can be determined, it is generally necessary to apply for the patents first, disclosing as much information and as many combinations as possible, hoping that at least one will be right. This can be followed up with a "continuation-in-part", which is a patent which expresses the original disclosed specifications in a different (and hopefully more accurate) manner.
You don't have to, but prudence suggests that it would be a good thing to do. The USPTO has a search web page where you yourself can look for similar patents. If you know of any similar patents or any public information which is similar to that of your invention, this must be disclosed in the patent application. The patent examiner will also search for similar patents during the process of the examination. One reason why it is a good idea to do some of the searching yourself is that if you find similar, but not identical material, it will help you differentiate your invention from what which has been done before.
The filing fees for a patent are listed in this USPTO web page, but these fees are tiny in relation to likely attorney's fees for writing and submitting a patent. At the time of this writing, patent attorneys generally charge between $150 to $250 per hour for writing and prosecuting a patent application, which can take as few as 20 hours or as many as a few hundred, depending on the complexity of the patent and the number of times that a response to the patent office must be written. There is no way of telling beforehand just how much an application will cost.
There is no easy answer to this; it is like choosing which brain surgeon to use. We personally choose our attorneys based on strong recommendations from others who have used them, their record in getting patents allowed, and the overall quality of their work. We suggest that you read patents that have been submitted by any candidate and see how concise and clear they are. We have seen too many patents where it looked like the attorney threw in everything but the kitchen sink, which raises the cost of the patent and can reduce its value. Patent attorneys often have special areas of expertise, and it is good, but not essential, that their area of expertise relates to your invention. If possible, choose an attorney whom you can visit, since face-to-face meetings are very useful in resolving problems and expediting an application.
You can also save money by doing your own brain surgery... Patent law is its own special realm, and we believe that this would be an unwise undertaking. You can file a provisional patent or perhaps a design patent yourself, but the complexities of claim construction and arguments for a utility patent take a great deal of experience to do correctly. Your time is better spent developing and selling the invention rather than in trying to learn a new profession.
This sounds like a trick question, but it is not. Although your patent attorney works for you and will keep your disclosures confidential, a patent attorney also is an officer of the court and has a "duty of candor" to the patent office. Anything that is detrimental to the patent application, even if it is learned from the inventor, must be reported it to the patent examiner.
We have had patents issue in as little as seven months and as long as four years. This does not depend on the complexity of the patent, but more on the invention's field and how many arguments must be filed with the examiner. In some busy fields such as bio-medicine, it can take over a year before the application is even looked at.
In a sense, it gives you some protection as soon as it is filed, since it allows you to call your invention "patent pending". You cannot bring action against an infringer until the patent actually issues, but the fact that a patent is pending on an invention may keep a potential infringer at bay.
Part of the art of intellectual property development is creating and managing a patent portfolio. A patent is a defensive instrument, like a fence or a moat. The more patents that issue on an invention, the more difficult it will be for an infringer to overcome all of them. Deciding what, and how many patents to file requires experience; there is no simple rule for it.
A patent gives you the right to prevent others from practicing your invention, but it does not necessarily give you the right to make a product incorporating your invention. This is a common and fundamental misunderstanding that can get an inventor into trouble. A common example of this is as follows: Suppose that individual 'A' invents a bucket and patents it. Later, individual 'B' discovers that it is hard to carry the bucket, so he invents a handle for it and patents the invention of a bucket with handle. Can 'B' then make a bucket with a handle? No - because the invention of the bucket is owned by 'A'. 'B' could make and sell the handle separately, but the bucket itself cannot be made without 'A's consent. This is why "cross licensing" and other alliances are common; they let both parties get the benefit of separately developed technologies. The moral here is to make sure that all aspects of your invention not covered by your patent are in the public domain.
A utility patent is valid for 20 years following the filing date. However, a good intellectual property management technique is to periodically develop and patent improvements which can extend the effective life of the invention. Even if the original patents expire and a competitor can make the original invention, it is unlikely to gain a market share against the improved version. Sometimes even small improvements are enough to ensure a product's dominance.
First, you should pray that you have deep pockets. Sometimes a notice of infringement is enough to frighten off an infringer, but often it is not, because of the costs and complexities of filing a patent infringement suit. The minimum cost of a patent infringement suit is likely to be $500,000 or more, and it is not uncommon for legal fees to run into millions of dollars, which may not be recoverable. However, if it can be shown that the infringer does so willfully, the court can award triple damages. Worse, depending upon the complexity of the case, time for discovery, depositions and appeals, between three years and a decade can pass before the case is settled.
These problems of litigation make it doubly important that your invention is protected by as many diverse patents as possible. If you believe that your patent is being infringed, the first thing to do is to locate a patent litigator, which is yet another patent law specialist.