Monday, November 26, 2012

Automatic Extraction&Analysis of PCT Information


Motivation

How many times you found yourself calculating your client's PCT characteristics when an analysis or national phase prosecution is required?? From number of pages through number of claims (and independent claims), drawings, IPC, to translation issues and number of words....

That was the motivation for us to build a straightforward engine that do all the extraction stuff for you. Including statistical and other helpful advanced information to dramatically short your analysis work and give you the ability to deal with business only. 

Another motivation for automatic extraction of PCT information is to provide a quick & easy quote for National Phase entry, for a desired PCT application.
Such a quote should be obtained by automatic download of the PCT details required for the quote, without the need to get into the online register, look for the data manually, and perform repetitive work.

What we do

Once requested, the smart engine enters into online registers (WIPO For example) in order to automatically extract the PCT details, and save it in a well-structured format (txt file, xml etc.). Once a PCT Application Number or a PCT Publication Number is inserted, the data can be downloaded by the system so as to further insert it easily into the docketing system, by the client’s internal development effort in-house.
Once PCT details are extracted, with a minimal customization that adds your quote formula, a quote can be automatically generated within the system itself. Such mechanism provides end-2-end service, once a PCT application or publication number is inserted. A National Phase entry quote might be a complex one (depending on the number of the countries in which NP is required, official fee formula differences, service fees etc.), so taking this tool a step further might be an option as well.
In addition, manual update of the PCT specification (#claims etc. required for the NP entry) is enabled in order to provide flexibility in the quote generation.

Web Access

An online service that includes an ability to insert a PCT Application or Publication Number, review the results, and download the result in a txt, Xls or XML format.
Once proper configuration is introduced, automatic quotes for national phase filing can be obtained to include official fees, service fees and translation fees, where applicable.

Online Service Main Screens:

Log-in


Input


Output



Sunday, October 21, 2012

מסחור פטנטים


מבקר המדינה מצא כי מאות פטנטים ממתינים למסחור: 
לפי הממצאים, מעל ל 2000!!!! פטנטים "שוכבים" במוסדות האקדמיים בישראל וממתינים למסחור

מכך נובע כי מעבר להכנסה העצומה שיכולה להתקבל ממסחור (מכירה, רשיון שימוש, וכו') הפטנטים, ידע רב נשאר בתוך המוסדות. ידע שאם היה בשימוש עסקי היה תורם רבות לכלכלה ולמעמד הטכנולוגי בעולם. והרבה מעבר לכסף, היה כנראה עשוי להציל חיים (פטנטים רפואים) השמורים במחלקות המחקר

מנסיונינו בתחום ומהיכרות מקרוב איך אירגוני מחקר מנהלים את מאגר הפטנטים שלהם, אני כלל לא מופתע מהממצאים. המוסדות המתקדמים במדינה עדיין מנהלים את מאגר המידע, אולי החשוב ביותר שלהם, באקסלים, רשימות במחברות או בכלי ניהול מיושנים ומסובכים. מעבר לעניין ש "יד ימין לא יודעת מה שמאל רוצה", אין כל הכוונה במטודולוגיה הקיימת למסחור הפטנטים. עבודה במערכת לא מתאימה גורמת לא פעם לסרבול ואיבוד הצפון עד כדי כך ששוכחים או לא בדיוק יודעים איך וממי לגבות תגמולים על רשיונות שימוש בפטנט

בכלי פשוט וזול יחסית אותו פיתחנו עבור אחד מגופי המחקר הקיימים בארץ, הצלחנו לשנות את המצב תוך שבועות בודדים. כלי זה מרכז את כל פעילות הפטנט מרגע העלאת הרעיון ועד מסחורו, תוך מעקב הכנסות והוצאות בנושא, הכולל מערכת התראות בגין מועד הזכות לתגמולים וחלוקת האחזקות בכל פטנט

כלי ניהול קניין רוחני משולב, התומך בניהול מחזור החיים של קניין רוחני משלב בחינת ההמצאה, עבור במעקב על רישום פטנטים (בשלבים השונים ובמדינות השונות) עד לשלב מסחור הפטנט
הכלי מאפשר ניהול אינטואיטיבי של החלקים העסקיים (הכנסות, הוצאות, ספקים), המקצועיים (פרטי ותחום ההמצאה, צורך, השוק וכו'), הארגוניים (פרטי הממציאים, אחוזי בעלות, שיוך ארגוני במקרה של בעלות צולבת וכו') והניהוליים (אבני דרך פרוייקטליים, תזכורות, פעולות לביצוע וכו')
בנוסף, בזכות בנייה חכמה ומודולרית של בסיס הנתונים, דו"חות וסטטיסטיקות מפורטים מיוצרים באופן שוטף ואוטומטי, ומאפשרים לייצר בסיס ניתוח רחב להנהלת החברה לצורכי מעקב עסקי וקבלת החלטות

המעבר משלב הניירות, המחברות וקבצי האקסל למערכת מסודרת, מרוכזת ומנוהלת, שינה את אופי ההתנהלות של הלקוח בצורה דרמטית. השליטה הניהולית והיכולת לתרגם אותה לרווחים עסקיים פיננסיים, נתנה את אותותיה כבר בשלבים הראשונים של ההטמעה

Thursday, September 27, 2012

IDS Assurance – Are we really on the safe side?



The importance if IDS submission throughout the patent registration process, is no longer controversial[1]. Beyond the legal obligation to the USPTO prosecution process, the IDS submission provides the legal cover for potential lawsuits against the patent or certain claims within it. The question is, whether I should rest assure that while submitting all IDS information, I am really protected. The intuition would be that the answer is yes, but when dealing with such a huge and unwieldy system like the USPTO, such question could be in place.
Until a few years ago, the IDS submission process was done manually, i.e. by printing and mailing tons of documents. The chance that some of it got lost is by no means low. The ability of the Patent Attorney to track all IDS items is not simple. Since the prosecution process might take years, we find ourselves in a situation where many IDS could be lost, thus endangering the patent validity. Even nowadays, when online submission is available, complete IDS or a few items within it, might be lost due to human errors, internet connection problems, USPTO website malfunctioning or not-considered items by the examiner.

Fig.1 – Potential errors in USPTO website

From our vast experience in working with Patent Attorney firms, we found that the gap between what patent attorneys believe they submitted to what was actually submitted and received in the USPTO, is beyond any imagination. This gap is huge in regard to the percentage of the files (patent applications) that contain missing items as well as in regard to the number of the missing items within each file. Obviously, only those items that do reside within the USPTO are relevant for any potential lawsuit against the registered patent, and not those items that reside in the Patent Attorney docketing system (whether they were sent to the USPTO but never received, or whether they have not been sent at all).


The only way to avoid such scenario is to perform a comparative check between IDS items within the docketing system and the IDS items reside in USPTO PAIR website, per file. Such a test, for a specific patent application, in any given moment, could verify and assure that all items which the patent attorney planned to submit were actually submitted to the USPTO and received by the patent examiner. In case a gap is found, it can be fixed before any potential damage is done. Such manual test, for an average file, could take a while, depending on the docketing system complexity and the skill of the one who actually performs it:
1.       All 1449 documents in the USPTO (scanned PDFs) need to be extracted from the USPTO PAIR website (these documents represent the summary of the IDS items  in each IDS submission)
2.       All items marked as submitted should be extracted from the docketing system
3.       Each item in the docketing system should be looked for in the 1449 documents so as to verify it actually exist there

Fig. 2 – Simple 1449 document sample (taken from USPTO website)

In case there are only a few items, then such an act could be quick and straightforward. When there are many items and/or we have a lot of files to verify, this is a different story. Such activity could take a lot of time, be very expensive (in man power terms) and most important – vulnerable to human errors. In big Patent Attorney firms, who file many patent applications every year, such testing process is so expensive and complicated that it is nearly impossible, therefore get hardly done.  


Fig.3 –1449 document that is not considered by the examiner (taken from USPTO website)


It seems that there is a need to a system, which would be able to connect to both docketing system and USPTO PAIR website, extract the relevant information per patent application and compare it. Since the USPTO PAIR data is scanned and saved in an Image format, the system should be able to convert it to a readable format (readable PDF, text etc.), prior to performing the comparison. Without such ability, the system would not be able to provide an appropriate comparison between items.
In addition, allowing the user to ‘mark’ problematic items, thus ‘telling’ the docketing system that these items need to be re-submitted, is a requested feature.


Fig.5 –Heavily loaded 1449 document; Page 1 out of 6


[1] Recent Court Decisions Highlight the Importance of IDSs:
v  McKesson Info. Solutions v. Bridge Medical, Inc., 487 F.3d 897 (Fed. Cir. 2007)
v  Larson Mfg. Co. v. Aluminart Prods. Ltd., 559 F.3d 1317 (Fed. Cir. 2009)
v  Dayco Prods. Inc. v. Total Containment, Inc., 329 F.3d 1358 (Fed Cir. 2003) 
v  Therasense, Inc. v. Becton, Dickinson & Co., 2010 WL 1655391 (Fed. Cir. April 26, 2010) (granting petition for rehearing en banc and vacating previous decision)

App4Reg is led by skilled Hi-Tech professionals with over 40 years of accumulated experience at R&D and Project Management. Our past experience lies within Telecom industries and tier-1 operators million dollars project management.
We work together with our clients to seamlessly provide automated solutions for client intellectual property strategies. 
Our strength derives from years of experience in the Patent-Trademark business combined with years of software expertise. We are on the cutting edge of the technology that supports automated patent submission processing. Our experience, the combination of software expertise and patent expertise, positions us to provide software systems that are tailored to our clients needs.