“Is there such a thing as a worldwide patent?” That’s a question I get all of the time, as many inventors are concerned that their inventions are “protected” globally. Since this question and concern comes up frequently, I thought I’d write a post specifically on this topic. To make a long story short, there is [...]
I have been surprised by the number of people who have asked me if a food (or a food ingredient) can be patented. To be honest, I never thought about patenting a food until these questions popped up in this forum. I’ve researched this a bit. It seems, in certain instances, food products and food [...]
Creating a working prototype can be one of the most daunting steps in the entire invention and patent process. For some of my inventions — particularly mechanical ones — the first thing I do is roam hardware stores in search of components that I can cobble together to make a crude, but functional, device. I [...]
The simple answer to these three popular questions is: No. First and foremost, every invention must be totally “novel”. It must be something that the inventor conceived of independent of any other source. It cannot have existed anywhere before. Hence, that’s why it is an “invention”. The “novel” aspect is so critically important, it is [...]
