Provisional and Non-Provisional Patents, Patent Agents vs. Patent Attorneys
Patent fees are collected at various points in the patent application process. If the provisional application was not prepared well, the work done in preparation can’t be carried over to the final patent registration. As restated at artworksnj.org you need to file a non-provisional patent application prior to the end of the provisional application validity; this step is required within a year.
A utility patent application is a request for a patent that describes and claims an invention, which is pending in the patent office. If you want to get started with a patent application, it’s recommended to apply for the more affordable provisional one that gives you protection for a year. You’ll also get to understand how to file a patent application and what’s involved in the general patents process. The more thorough your prior art search, the more thorough your patent application will be since you will be able to illustrate exactly how your invention is distinguished from other inventions.
The provisional patent application gives you a full year to develop your product and research the market before deciding whether to file an official patent application. Once the prosecution of the patent application is completed, you either have some, all, or no claims accepted and other rejected.
The point of novelty is what makes the patent application useful for protecting your intellectual property. You may want to consider a patent attorney that knows about the invention you have.
A corresponding nonprovisional patent application may be filed at any time before the one year time period is over to maintain both pendency of your invention as well as the priority date of the provisional patent application.
A patent agent must have passed the test for the US Patent and Trademark Office; a patent attorney has passed that test and they’re also an attorney; you’ll find further reading at Patent Lawyers in Houston at Your Service - Swap 42. The one significant difference between a patent attorney and patent agent is the fact that an attorney has obtained a law degree whereas a patent agent has not.
A full understanding of patent law will help you protect your intellectual property more effectively. The majority of law firms specializing in IP use both patent attorneys and patent agents to write inventors’ patent submissions. Ideally, a patent law firm should help with licensing products after the patent is approved.
The whole patent process starts even before sending your applications to the USPTO. You can try and avoid problems with your patents by using other ways to protect them.
How do I get started?
There is a very small fee for applying for a provisional patent application. This makes provisional patent applications a cost-effective strategy upfront. To figure out if a provisional application is the right one for your strategy, you’ll need help from a Artworks NJ.