Jamie's Sons Interview Us About Patents!

00:02 Samar Shah
Hello, and welcome to the Patent Pending Made Simple Podcast. I'm your host, Samar Shah, and with me today is Jamie Brophy and a few special guests. Jamie, how are you?

00:11 Jamie Brophy
Hi, Samar. I'm good. I'm super excited about our special guests today, so I think I'll go ahead and introduce them. Is that okay?

00:20 Samar Shah
Yeah, that'd be great.

00:22 Jamie Brophy
Okay, so two guests with me today, and I'm hoping we can start out by just giving us your name, your age, and how we know each other.

00:35 Griffin and Jordan
So I am Griffin, I'm 13 years old, and Jamie is my mom.

00:42 Jamie Brophy
That's right. Good job. My second special guest, give us your name, your age, and how we know each other.

00:51 Griffin and Jordan
Okay. I am Jordan. My age is ten, and she's my mom.

00:59 Samar Shah
Welcome to the show, Jordan.

01:02 Jamie Brophy
So, Samar I brought my boys on here today because they had some questions about patents, and I thought it would be great to go through them. Sometimes adults also have questions about patents, but they think maybe their questions are too basic or too simplistic, and adults can be afraid to ask questions, and these guys aren't afraid to ask anything, so I thought I would have them ask us some questions today. Are you ready?

01:30 Samar Shah
I am ready. It sounds like they are, too.

01:33 Jamie Brophy
Yeah. Okay, so, Jordan, what's our first question?

01:38 Griffin and Jordan
What is a patent?

01:40 Jamie Brophy
What is a patent? All right, Samar, do you want to take that?

01:43 Samar Shah
Yeah, I can try. So a patent is essentially a piece of paper that says that you invented something, and it gives you some rights. It gives you the rights to stop other people from making or selling or using that invention. So a patent is a piece of paper that helps you protect something you've invented. Jamie, I'm sure I've missed a bunch of things. So do you have anything to add to that?

02:09 Jamie Brophy
I don't think so. Yeah, it's a legal document. Do you guys have any questions about what he said? No. We're ready for the next question. Yeah. Have you seen a patent before? No.

02:24 Griffin and Jordan
Piece of paper.

02:27 Jamie Brophy
I'm sure they've seen them electronically, but funny enough, the last time I took my oldest son to the dentist, his dentist had a red ribbon copy hanging up in his oh, I thought that was pretty cool. Yeah, that might have been my oldest son's first time seeing an actual patent.

02:46 Samar Shah
Oh, very cool. I'm going to send you guys some pictures because I get copies of the patents that Jamie works on, that I work on before we send them out to our clients. So I'm going to send you guys some pictures so you can take a look.

03:00 Jamie Brophy
Cool. All right, Griffin, you got another question? Yeah.

03:04 Griffin and Jordan
Okay, so how do you get a patent?

03:07 Jamie Brophy
How do you get a patent? Samar, should I take this?

03:10 Samar Shah
Yeah. Go for it, Jamie.

03:12 Jamie Brophy
Okay, so to get a patent, you have to write a patent application, submit your patent application to the Patent Office, and then the Patent Office looks at your application to make sure that it meets certain requirements. There are certain things you have to have in your patent application, and also the Patent Office determines whether your invention is patentable, and they do that by doing some research, seeing if there's anything exactly like it or similar to it that's already been invented. And if they determine that your invention is new and it's not obvious, then you get a patent. But it kind of takes a long time. It can take a few years. Samar, do you have anything to add to that?

03:58 Samar Shah
I think that's pretty good. And you guys are asking really good questions, because every time I get on a call with a new client, they ask me exactly the same thing. They said, how do we get one? How long is it going to take? And I tell them it's quite a long process. It usually takes three to four years sometimes to get a patent. And in order to get one, your invention has to meet those requirements that Jamie mentioned. And additionally, you have to do a good job writing that application and that piece of paper. So you have to be both very careful about how you're writing it. You had to meet all the requirements, and you have to be very smart and strategic about how you're going to try to protect your invention. And that's what we do. We think about a lot about how to be careful and how to be smart when we're writing that application.

04:50 Jamie Brophy
All right. That's a long time. That is a long time.

04:53 Samar Shah
Yeah.

04:53 Jamie Brophy
All right, Jordan, what's your next question?

04:57 Griffin and Jordan
Why do you need a patent?

05:01 Samar Shah
That's a good question, too. So, as I mentioned before, the patent gives you the right to stop other people from copying or making, using or selling the invention that you have protected. So the patent was initially a contract. That the framers of our constitution. It's a contract that we're worried that if people came up with really cool inventions that helped the society and helped the world be a better place, that they would keep it a secret and they wouldn't tell anybody about it because they want to make money off of that invention. But we want to spread our inventions, and if somebody has an idea that makes the world better, we want them to share it and encourage them to share it. So the patent gives you a term of about 20 years to practice your invention by yourself so only you could profit from it, and it prevents other people from copying you and trying to undercut you.

05:58 Samar Shah
So that's why you typically need a patent, is because it gives you a term of exclusivity or a time that only you can practice it without having to have other people or without worrying about other people copying your invention.

06:12 Jamie Brophy
All right, does that answer your question, Jordan. Do you have any other questions about that?

Okay, so I think Griffin's got our next question.

06:21 Griffin and Jordan
What are some difficulties in getting a.

06:25 Samar Shah
OOH, that's a good one, too. Jamie, do you want to try to take this one?

06:30 Jamie Brophy
Yeah, so I think some difficulties are I mean, we've already talked about it can take a long time. Usually when you file a patent application, the first communication you'll get from the patent office will be a rejection. And that's pretty typical. So just communicating back and forth with the patent office, there can be a few rounds of those communications back and forth. But I think the main difficulty that we encounter in getting a patent is the question of obviousness. Is your invention obvious over something else? And that can be a pretty complicated question. It can be difficult to understand. Sometimes it looks like the references that the examiner is citing in their rejection look nothing like yours. But if there are features in common, the examiner could say that it's obvious. And sometimes that doesn't make a lot of sense. If you don't have a lot of experience with patents and a lot of experience dealing with obviousness questions, I find that to be the main difficulty that we encounter.

07:40 Jamie Brophy
Samar what do you think are some of the difficulties of getting a patent?

07:44 Samar Shah
Yeah, I think that's a big one that you mentioned, Jamie. The other big one that I think about a lot is whether the document that we're writing will actually cover the invention. And not just the invention as somebody might have come up with it, but somebody could try to design around that invention. Right. So imagine that you created an invention for something and somebody changed it slightly to now copy your invention, right. If you have a patent, you would want to stop that person from just changing some small piece of your invention and bringing it to market. So we think about how do we not just protect the exact thing that you have invented, but also other variations of it to stop people from designing around or making variations of that invention. And that could be a challenge because the more other bases that you try to cover, the more the invention starts looking like other things that might be out there.

08:41 Samar Shah
So there is a challenge. There's a push and a pull there to try to get the patent allowed. You want to have as broad a coverage as possible, but if you go too broad, then it's going to start looking like other things that are out there. So there is an interpretation tug of war, so to speak, that happens at the patent office.

08:59 Jamie Brophy
Yeah, I would agree with that as well. So I think those two main things dealing with obviousness rejections from the patent office and making sure that the application is broad, but not too broad. Does that make sense? Yeah. All right. So, Jordan, what's your next question.

09:21 Griffin and Jordan
If you have an invention, do you have to get a patent?

09:23 Samar Shah
That's also a very good question, and the answer is no, you don't have to get a patent. In fact, most of the things that you see on the store shelves when you go to a Target or a Walmart, most things are not patented. So you definitely don't need a patent in order to sell your product in the marketplace. But you do have to be careful, because if somebody else has a patent, like I said, they could stop you from bringing your product out onto the shelves. So you could go through a lot of expensive process for manufacturing and selling your product, and somebody can later come back and say, well, you actually can't sell this thing without our permission because we have a patent. So that's something you should be careful about. But generally, you don't need a patent, and most products don't have a patent.

10:15 Samar Shah
But if you are going to sell something, you should check and make sure you're not infringing on somebody else's patent.

10:22 Jamie Brophy
And do you understand, based on the answers that we've already given you, if you don't have a patent, what could happen? Yeah, what could happen?

10:31 Griffin and Jordan
People steal your idea.

10:32 Jamie Brophy
Yeah. And then no way to stop that. If you have a patent, you can say, hey, I have a patent on this. You can't just steal it. Right? Yeah.

10:42 Griffin and Jordan
But it's like if you don't have a patent, it's like letting someone take your wallet.

10:47 Samar Shah
Yeah.

10:50 Jamie Brophy
All right, what's your next question? Griffin.

10:53 Griffin and Jordan
Okay, so it takes a long time to get a patent, but why does it take so long?

10:58 Samar Shah
Another good question. Well, there are a lot of people applying for patents at the United States Patent Office. So that's the organization that reviews patent applications. And maybe, Jamie, you should talk about that and I'll circle back here.

11:13 Jamie Brophy
Yeah. You guys know I used to work at the Patent office, right?

11:17 Griffin and Jordan
Yeah.

11:17 Jamie Brophy
Well, way before you were. So some areas of the Patent office just have a really long backlog. They get hundreds of thousands of patent applications every year. And in some fields where there's a lot of innovation going on, that backlog can be really long. So it could take a long time to get your first communication from the patent office. That could be two, three years sometimes. And then sometimes you have to go back and forth communicating with the patent office, responding to rejections. Sometimes they issue another rejection. So that process can take a while. So that is why it takes so long. You can, of course, pay extra to make it go faster, but that's generally why it takes. Jordan, you have another question? Yeah.

12:08 Griffin and Jordan
How much does it cost to get.

12:11 Samar Shah
That'S also a good question. So the prices can vary and be all over the place, depending on how complex your invention is. We charge about $10,000, roughly, to get a patent filed, and then it could take another anywhere from $3,000 to argue with the patent office about whether your invention is obvious or not. But by the time you're all said and done, you have usually spent about $15,000 to $20,000 to get a patent. So it's a very expensive piece of document.

12:47 Griffin and Jordan
That's a lot for a piece of paper.

12:49 Samar Shah
It is probably one of the most expensive pieces of paper that you're going to get. So that's very true.

12:57 Griffin and Jordan
Okay, this is our last question. Once you get a patent, what do you do with it?

13:04 Samar Shah
That also a good question. Well, you hopefully don't have to do much. You have to mark your product. So when you're going to sell it at a shelf or at a store, you have to mark it that, hey, I have a patent on this thing. So you're giving a notice to everyone else who's going to think about potentially stealing your idea or copying your idea. So you mark it as patented, and then you hopefully don't do anything. But if somebody does end up copying your invention, you can send them a letter and say, hey, I have a patent on this thing, which means that I have the exclusive grant from the United States government to practice its invention. Nobody else can do this. So you can send them a letter and tell them to stop. If they don't stop, you have to take them to court.

13:51 Samar Shah
You had to file a lawsuit and have a judge or a jury resolve the question of whether somebody infringes and whether they're allowed to create a copycat product or not. So it gives you a right to sue people in federal courts.

14:07 Jamie Brophy
Does that answer your question? Okay. Do you guys have any other questions about patents?

14:15 Griffin and Jordan
No.

14:16 Jamie Brophy
Those law of questions, that was a lot of questions. You got everything answered?

14:21 Griffin and Jordan
Yeah.

14:22 Jamie Brophy
No more burning questions. All right, well, thanks, you guys. This was fun. Thanks for coming today. Fun chatting with you about my job.

14:32 Samar Shah
You're welcome. You guys asked wonderful questions. In fact, these are the same questions that a lot of inventors call us and ask us about. So you guys did a really good job.

14:44 Griffin and Jordan
Thank you.

14:45 Jamie Brophy
Yeah. All right. Thanks, guys. Yes. All right, Samar, we'll talk to you next time.

14:55 Samar Shah
This was fun! Talk to you on the next one!

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