PATENTS

The firm can assist you with pursuing utility, design or plant patent protection in almost any technological art both domestically and internationally, as well as with patentabilty opinions, patent validity and infringement analyses, and licensing and enforcing your patent rights.

Some people confuse patents, copyrights, and trademarks. Although there may be some similarities among these kinds of intellectual property protection, they are different and serve different purposes.

What is a Patent?

A patent for an invention is the grant of a property right to the inventor, issued by the US Patent and Trademark Office. The term of a new utility patent is 20 years from the date on which the application for the patent was filed in the United States or, in special cases, from the date an earlier related application was filed, subject to the payment of maintenance fees. US patent grants are effective only within the US, US territories and US possessions and are issued by the US Patent and Trademark Office.

The right conferred by the patent grant is, in the language of the statute and of the grant itself, "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. What is granted is not the right to make, use, offer for sale, sell or import, but the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, selling or importing the invention.