A typical United States Patent costs between $8,000 and $10,000 to obtain. You can expect to spend about $6,000 to have the patent drafted and filed. The rest of the money will be spent over the next 2 years in the preparation of legal briefs arguing for the patentability of your case and in federal issue fees if you are ultimately successful. Here’s how that total breaks down:

Step 1 – Patent Search. This step involves searching the prior patents and possibly other relevant publications in order to determine (1) Whether your proposed invention is patentable; and (2) If so, what will be the likely coverage of the patent obtained. You can expect to spend $900 on this step.

Step 2 – Preparing and filing a U.S. utility patent application. This step involves drafting the patent specification, the claims, the drawings, and the preparation of all associated forms. You can expect to spend $3,000.00 to $5,000.00 for this portion of the process. You will also have to pay the U.S. government filing fee of $730 (assuming you qualify for the small entity discount).

Step 3 – Drafting amendments and/or responsive arguments. About 18 months after file your application you should receive a response from the government. Many patent applications are rejected on their first pass through. If that happens, it will be necessary to draft amendments and accompanying legal briefs. You can expect to spend about $2,000 on this step.

Step 4 – Issue. Once a patent application is allowed, the U.S. government charges a $480 issue fee. This fee is not assessed until the government has issued a document stating that you are entitled to the patent. Thus, the issue fee is a risk free expenditure. You should also be aware that the U.S. government now charges a $300 (small entity) publication fee in most applications.

What does a patent do for you?

A patent gives you an effective monopoly for its entire term – which is typically about 18 years. If you create a successful product you can bet that you will soon have competition and that the competition will drive your profit down – if not eliminate it altogether. A patent locks out competition for the patented product. This can be a tremendous market advantage.

In addition, the possession of a patent is almost indispensable if you want to license your product to an existing manufacturer. Companies will sometimes accept outside submissions, but it is quite rare for them to pay any meaningful royalty unless you have a patent.

Before attempting to patent an idea or invention, be sure you have completed the following basic steps:

Have you researched your idea to be sure it is not already invented? Many inventors approach only to learn that their idea already exists. The Internet is a great tool to look for similar inventions. Using Google or other search engines is a great way to find products. Search using several different key words and look for similar products. The USPTO (www.uspto.gov) is the official government site for patents, and this is also a great place to look, but it is generally not a user-friendly as Google.

Have you calculated how much money you may make from your invention? It always amazed me how many people never took time to estimate how much they can make from their inventions. Here are some helpful tips. If you plan to license your idea, expect to receive 3%~6% royalties, and that is after you find someone to license it. Expect to spend at least $15,000 or more on travel and attorney fees if you license it yourself.

If you use a broker or licensing firm, they will take at least 25% of your royalty, and there is no guarantee that you will get a deal. In addition to that, many firms charge fees, so be sure you know how much these fees are and what you receive for them. If you plan to manufacture and sell the product yourself, be sure you have a solid business plan first. I personally do not recommend this unless you have experience running a company, or have partners and/or advisors to help you.

Do you know your competition? Many people make the mistake of assuming that just because they make something better than existing products that they will sell millions. This is not true. Consider the little aluminum kick-and-go scooters that were popular about 7 years ago. These appeared out of nowhere, and they sold millions the first year. Two years later there were at least 10 versions of these, and almost all of them were better than the original. Unfortunately the fad was over, and nobody cared. Most of the companies went broke.

Be sure there is a market for your product. If possible, go to industry trade organizations and try to find out how many similar products are sold every year, what they sell for, and what features they offer. This will give you some idea of the market size and sales potential.

How will you market your product? Having a good idea and making a prototype is the easy part. Getting the product to market and getting people to buy it is the hard part. Be sure you have a plan IN WRITING! If it won’t work on paper it won’t work in the real world! If you are not sure how to do this, some suggestions are to attend trade shows and meet with Manufactures Sales Representatives. Most of them are ex sales and marketing professionals that independently represent products.

Another option is Internet sales and distributors that offer similar products to your invention. Local colleges and universities are also great sources for help. Many professors teaching sales and marketing classes are often looking for “real world” class projects.

Many firm prosecutes patent applications in different technical and scientific fields, including consumer devices, biotechnology, pharmaceutical, and the medical device industry. Their procedure for prosecuting patent application includes interviewing the inventor, conducting a prior art search, preparing a draft of the patent application, advising client regarding drawings, and completing prosecution of the patent.

These patenting firms, such as InventHelp, are not limited to representing business, academic, or industrial institutions. They also serve independent inventors and non-institutional clients.

In some instances, a company or inventor develops a new invention and the inventor has concerns about infringing a valid patent. In those situations, their can conduct an investigation and draft a freedom to operate and infringement opinion. This opinion evaluates existing patents and the proposed technology to see if the proposed technology infringes a valid United States patent. This opinion will allow the client to develop an effective strategy for dealing with issued patents.

Some inventors and institutions do not wish to hold onto their patents themselves. In these circumstances, the inventor will look to sell his patent rights. This can come in the form of either a licensing agreement or a full-fledged assignment of rights. A licensing agreement is different from an assignment agreement in that a licensing agreement is not a transfer of all the rights of the patent holder. In contrast, an assignment is when the patent holder transfers all of his rights in the patent as you can see from https://azbigmedia.com/inventhelp-can-help-turn-your-invention-into-reality/.

It is extremely important that, as an inventor, you educate yourself on all types of patent law, including foreign patent laws. You can best do this via the aid of a knowledgeable patent lawyer. You do, however, want to make sure that the attorney you hire has experience with and is well versed in your and foreign country patent laws. Also, the foreign market could well be a wonderful and lucrative source of income for you as a result of securing the intellectual property rights to your invention. While you may have to follow certain rules such as using a patent agent to file your patent, you can definitely protect yourself and your invention if you become informed.

In the state of USA, a patent gives you the legal right to prevent others from using your idea without your permission, requiring them to either buy the patent from you or pay you a royalty fee. A patent, in other words, allows you to profit greatly from your idea or invention.

Once and inventor creates a product the first step should be to prepare a detailed description of the product for the filing process. When filing a patent, you are documenting and claiming ownership of the invention, similar to a title to a car or deed to a home. During the documentation process, sketches or detailed drawings should also be made for a clear understanding of any proprietary design.

It is important to correctly and accurately complete the patent process, not only to protect your product, but because the patent becomes a very valuable asset that can eventually be sold or leased. It is wise to consult a patent lawyer or a patent agency, such as InventHelp, prior to starting this detailed and crucial process.

Patents generally protect products or processes, which include new technical or functional aspects. They protect the ideas behind how things work. If you are spending money on research and development of new products or processes, then patenting should be on the cards.

Any company investing in R & D can not afford to ignore the power patents have in protecting this investment. Patent protection provides the possibility of obtaining a monopoly in the desired country or countries up to 20 years from the filing date for the invention as explained in http://www.sfweekly.com/sponsored/why-inventors-turn-to-experts-like-inventhelp/.

By patenting your invention, you can now also obtain significant company tax reduction through the Patent Box system. This could easily cover your initial patent costs.

If you are a patent holder and want to be aware of the rules, regulations and safety measures is vital to know the type of violation, then the defense strategy and resources to them. The main role of patent attorneys is the preparation and filing a patent application. It includes several steps as follows:

They need to understand the invention, notes or any description that you provide to him. May require drawings or sketches or prototype as well as described in https://www.sfexaminer.com/marketplace/how-can-you-benefit-from-inventhelp/ article. Once the lawyer will get an idea of what your exposure is all about he can ask some questions like:

• What is new or inventive idea as owner of the patent?
• How does your invention differs from existing idea?
• What are the advantages?
• What are the problems that need immediate attention?
• How is to exploit the invention?
• Is expected that patent protection will help your business?

Then the patent attorney will consider the feasibility of the invention. Depending on your experience and technique may be recommended that the implementation of the new search if someone has already done before. This is necessary to determine whether patent protection is useful for you and what type of protection more or less extensive one for you. Once all these factors are considered, patent attorney expressed written in the form of a “claim” that defines the essential features of the invention and how they interrelate.

At the same time is necessary to ascertain the possibility of defining the invention in broader term that contains all the possible ways of implementing the invention. In a few short lines patent lawyers demand has to express the analysis carried out and essential characteristics. It takes a lot of thought, technical information. There are also experienced patent agencies like InventHelp that can help you out in this step.

Wed to cover features a number of subsidiary claims must be made with technical and legal aspects. The descriptive part of the invention must provide sufficient information to enable the reader to enable it in practice. All this together requires a broad knowledge of patent law and practice, the ability to understand and explain the technology and put together all this knowledge before it the written project will be considered by the court and other patent attorneys. Thus, a patent attorney are in very high esteem and values.