<p>Is anyone familiar with the procedures of becoming a patent lawyer?</p>
<p>I googled it but there was way to much info so I’m just going to be lazy and take my chances here.</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=52383[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=52383</a></p>
<p>I made a topic since I was in the same position. There are a bunch of experienced people who answered my questions, so you can ask them too, which is good, since I’d like to keep it bumped for reference.</p>
<p>Being lazy isn’t much of a recommendation for becoming a patent lawyer. Try to overcome the inertia and check the website at uspto.gov for information</p>
<p>Dadodsam–I’m trying to help my dad file a patent for his company and was wondering if it would be likely that the patent would be approved without the aid of a lawyer?</p>
<p>Masta: the USPTO will try to give assistance to individual inventors trying to prosecute their own patent applications. That might not be the case with a patent application that is owned by a company, even a small company. However, recent court decisions in patent cases have made it clear that a lot of care must be taken in preparing and prosecuting patent applications in order for the claims to be sustained against attack. </p>
<p>If the patent will have any value, and your father’s company is trying to keep costs down, you should at least have it reviewed by a competent patent attorney or patent agent before it is filed. It is better to have the application prepared by one. The job of the patent examiner is to act on what is filed, not to help inventors obtain good-quality patents. Some inventors have learned how to prepare and prosecute patent applications very well, and succeed on their own. However, for most, if you try to do it yourself, you may very well get a patent, but it could be a poor quality one, from the point of view of effective protection of the invention.</p>
<p>thanks…I’ll be sure to pass the information on to my dad…the company consists of him and myself, and paying the 20 grand or so in attorney fees was out of the question, I spent 20$ at barnes and nobles and got a do-it-yourself book, but would you know how to go about finding a patent agent just to review it (assuming the costs are nowhere near 20 grand)…if this is too much trouble…I appreciate the help provided in the previous posts.</p>
<p>Masta: I don’t know the basis of your $ 20,000 estimate, nor whether it covers only the preparation and filing of a patent application or the complete costs including preparation, prosecution and all government fees for the lifetime of the patent. The do-it-yourself books are of varying quailty, but none with which I am familiar is adequate to deal with a complicated patent application, for example one involving software or hardware. In short, in my opinion you will not be able to save $ 20,000 with a $ 20 book and a lot of do-it-yourself sweat equity.</p>
<p>To keep your costs low, your best bet is to find a patent attorney or agent with whom you can work, with you and/or your father doing as much writing as possible, and the attorney or agent writing the remainder and reviewing your work. To find an atorney or agent, you could try the Yellow Pages or cold - calling from the list of agents and attorneys at the USPTO web site (uspto.gov). You also might check the legal services section of eBay, as some attorneys or agents offer patent services at lower costs there. However, I am not familiar with any of these folks and don’t know whether the lower costs might result from low overhed, e.g.working out of a home office, or from skmping on the quality of the work. Your best bet would be to ask others in similar businesses for recommendations. In any case, you should check the experience of the attorney/agent and their capabilities just as you would do any other consultant for your company.</p>
<p>In five words or so, what type of technology or invention is involved, and what part of the country are you in?</p>
<p>the invention is a model for memory cells to speed up logic and fault simulation. I live in Mass. and went through the list of attorneys at USPTO and the quotes I got from a very basic explanation of our needs was around $20,000 (that was just the starting price and it would increase depending on how much time he/they would spend working on the patent.) My dad filed the provisional patent as an individual inventor and not as part of a corporation.</p>
<p>Masta: It sounds like your estimate is based on the cost of preparing a complete application to replace the provisional (that must be done no later than a year from the provisional’s filing date) with all the work done by the attorney, and might not include much additional time for prosecuting the application through the patent office. If your patent application is complex, $ 20,000 is on the high side, but not out of range for preparing the patent application, including having drawings made that meet patent office standards. You might try re-contacting any attorney that you felt was helpful and ask whether the cost could be reduced if you and/or your father did a substantial amount of the writing, or ask colleagues of your father in this field for recommendations. I can’t say how much you might save by writing part of the application yourselves, but you should be able to save some of that estimate.</p>
<p>You and your father may, in the end, have to increase your estimated cost for developing the product to include the patenting costs.</p>
<p>Good luck with it.</p>
<p>Do legal clinics at law schools do this? Some schools have IP clinics (such as American). They might at least be able to help.</p>
<p>thanks I appreciate the help…I’m going to call around again, find out if the rates would differ if we did the writing and drawing. The year is closely approaching so I’m not sure if we’ll even have the time to find an attorney to help, but thanks again for the suggestions.</p>