As a patent attorney, I can speak from experience on this point. But I have seen many people make a load of money on patents most would think are "stupid." I have also helped many inventors get patents on inventions that I believe are truly useful and valuable, and some have never seen a penny of a return on their investments. The ability to effectively market an invention is usually more important than having a good idea.

 

he bought everything from mr latham himself before the man died.so he still owns whatever has not fallen into the public domain. the company the name what ever trademarks and copyrights etc that mat still be in force

 

That is true. I thought you were talking about the technology. My bad.

 

Every time I see a new post in this thread I'm thinking "Cool it's out!"

 

me too

 

I would adapt the last sentence to: The ability to effectively develop, produce and market an invention is more important than patent it. Keep in mind, it is not a problem at all to purchase well made fake Swiss luxury watches in China. However, original Swiss luxury watches still sell well in China. (And its definitely not because of the strong international trademark protection).

Here's a good read about the value of patents (I don't entirely agree with everything he says, but he's not far off). http://www.tinaja.com/glib/casagpat.pdf

In the year 2006 173,772 patents were issued in the US. How many inventors actually receive royalties from their patents? With so many patents (over 1 Mio still effective) wouldn't there occasionally something be in the news from a large corporation paying royalties to an inventor? After all its a story that sells well.

No doubt, patents do have value, particularly for pharmaceutical companies. But as far as garage inventors and small companies are concerned, profit from patents is unfortunately almost always generated by the patent attorneys and not the inventors.

 

The thing is that if you work for a company they usualy put you under contract that basicly sais your thoughts belong to them. I have a friend that has several patents. He works for a company that helps make cars safer. He gets no royalties since he works for the company. He is well compensated though.

 

I don't remember that the companies I worked for ever paid royalties to anybody nor do I remember that the companies I worked for ever received royalties from anybody. (Although I have never worked for a big corporation, I worked for companies with up to 900 employees). Companies do this because strong IP portfolios are well sellable to investors and to reduce the probability that competitors would bother them with law suits - nobody cares about royalties. (I've been working in R&D for the last 10 years in different companies and have my name on a bunch of patents too (this is part of your duty when you work in this field). And if we found a patented idea we've always found a way to work around it.)

 

The only bad thing about a patent is that to file one you have to make all of the details of it public.

 

Well, it won't made public if one only files a provisional patent.

(A patent is not bad per se, but people ought to question the return on investment).

 

That is the "quid pro quo" for obtaining a government-sanctioned monopoly for a limited term.

 

Yeah, but a provisional patent doesn't give you any enforcement rights. It merely preserves your filing date and allows you to say that your invention is "patent pending." If you never convert it to a nonprovisional application, it does nothing for you.

FWIW, assuming something has been filed, the only thing that could be holding up RP's patent application from being "accepted" (at least precluding him from being able to claim "patent pending") would be filing an incomplete application (or one that is too informal to get a filing date). The "examination" of the substance of the application will likely take more than a year or two unless RP qualifies for a "petition to make special."

 

no doubt.

 

A question for the Patent Attorney. I worked for a company that was run by a Patent Attorney. I believe that the product developed was not invented by the owner himself but something he acquired during his work. The product was the first electronic dart board seen in many bars across the nation. How does this work and what are the ethics behind something like this?

 

And how does this relate to the Axial Flow Supercharger? Not like we need this thread to be anylonger that it already is.

 

I will answer and relate it to the AFS. If RP hires an employee to help develop the AFS, he should have the employee sign a contract that assigns the employee's rights to any resulting intellectual property to RP or AFE. Of course, sometimes when you allow your employee to share in the profits of his/her work, he/she works harder and is more creative. If you are suggesting that the invention was developed by a "client" of the patent attorney when the patent attorney had an attorney-client relationship with the client, then that is definitely a separate, complicated issue (but I would be willing to answer your question via PM).

I think we are all just eager for this product to be released. It sounds like production/distribution/flash issues are the main hold-ups. The patent filing should not be THAT complicated. After all the patent application is considered "pending" the date you put a completed application in the mail to the USPTO (assuming you use the recommended mailing protocol). Sometimes it takes several weeks to receive your filing confirmation from the patent office, but the Express Mail receipt may be used as proof of filing.

 

Leave us alone. We are trying our best to hold until the S/C is released. We are very anxious. In fact the Axial Flow is one of the main reasons I became a member. Well,...that and I saw a pic of Bunnygirl.

 

Bummer

On the patent issue, our office has 32 patent plaques hanging on the walls, with a host of others pending. They are a pain to get implemented.

How was the Tahoe run?

 

Sorry, I did not mean that to come across as an insult. I am just as anxious as you for this supercharger to be released.

 

Sorry if this is in some easily accessible spot that I overlooked, but are there any audio or video clips of this supercharger? I'd love to hear what it sounds like.

 

I had better hurry with my reverse engineering project of the AFSC. So far I have a blown up balloon and a pinwheel feeding more air into my Renesis. I am confident I can increase the .3 HP gain I am getting before Richard gets his patent. I am experimenting with stronger balloons, and various materials for the pinweel assembly.

I'll be taking orders soon.

 

Is This Coming Out Anytime Soon! Theres No Way Im Reading Through Over #)) Pages Of Crap> This Post Should Be Restarted>

 

There are quite a few of these whining types of posts that make it this long...

The info is in one spot for the AF SC why spread it out?

 

you get out what you put in. so far you are not doing well..

the the answer is when it is done.

beers

 

All I can say is RP's endevours have been splashed all over the internet in many other forums, and WHEN the AFSC is actually for retail sale, it will change the ENTIRE world of aftermarket supercharging.

I predict that either RP (AFE) will be picked up by a larger firm to continue work for other platforms, or AFE will need to add a few thousand ft^2 of production and a few hundred employees.