Widerman Malek, PL Attorneys Dan Pierron and Mark Malek attended the 2015 Association of University Technology Managers (AUTM) Annual Meeting held in New Orleans from February 22 to February 25. AUTM is a network of professionals that generate innovations, license and develop innovations, and provide various services to organizations to help monetize those innovations. The […]
Widerman Malek Law Blog
Starbucks vs. Exit 6 Brewery
On December 9th, 2013, Exit 6 brewery outside of St. Louis, Missouri received a cease and desist letter from one of America’s largest national chains for coffee, Starbucks. The Starbucks’ legal team contacted the brewpub in an effort to have the business stop using the term “Frappicino” to describe one of the brewery’s stouts, a […]
The Importance of Filing for Both Utility and Design Patents
While watching Shark Tank Season Five, Episode 10, I was reminded of the importance of filing for both a design and utility patent. The show aired a young family looking to gain financial backing to expand their growing lunchbox business. The couple started Yubo, an environmentally friendly customized lunchbox company. The beauty of their design […]
The Effect Of Listing An Improper Inventor On A Patent Application
The Effect Of Listing An Improper Inventor On A Patent Application
An inventor is someone that has had some sort of input into a claim that is listed in a patent application. If an improper inventor is listed on a patent application, then the patent that may eventually issue may be invalidated. This is also the case when not all of the inventors are listed on the patent application.
Who Is An Inventor In A Patent Application?
It is important for a patent application to list the proper inventors. An inventor is not just someone that you want to put on a patent application, but must be someone that contributed in some way to at least one claim in the patent application.
Getting A Refund From The Patent Office If You Are Now A Small Entity
By: Mark R. Malek This concludes the series of articles that I have been writing on entity status in the United States Patent Office. The first article introduced the new micro-entity status. The next article gave some background information on what would happen if you claimed the wrong entity status before the USPTO, and the latest […]
What Happens If You Claim The Wrong Entity Status In The Patent Office?
By: Mark R. Malek In my last article, I outlined the new filing status in the Patent Office that can save inventors even more money in the patent process – that of the micro-entity. As you may recall from that article, when filing a patent application (and throughout the patent prosecution process), you must pay […]
Patent Office Fees – The Micro Entity
By: Mark R. Malek As many of you may know, the United States Patent System recently went through a little transformation on March 15, 2013. The biggest and most public of these transformations was the transition from a first to invent system to a first to file system (more on that later). One thing that […]