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Anyone experienced in patenting and licensing?

Ioachim

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Hello, everyone.

I'm reading the Millionaire Fastlane , and I began to do research to execute some of my ideas. I would greatly appreciate if someone experienced in patenting and licensing can give me some advice.

I have an idea that I want to bring to reality, and I truly believe it has a good potential and can be developed and patented. It can be used to create both a stand-alone product and parts for a pre-existing product. Stephen Key of InventRight advises to spend as little time and $ as possible, and to file a provisional patent and to start contacting the potential companies with a sell sheet.

A Beginner's Guide: How to Rent Your Ideas to Fortune 500 Companies (Plus: Video)

How to Rent Your Ideas to Fortune 500 Companies: Part II (Plus: Hacking Japan Tips)

I don't have much $ I can spend right away without getting any feedback from a company, and another problem is that I am terrible at the mechanical part. For instance, if I were to invent a bicycle, I would come up with the idea of fast moving, wheels, seat, handle, and pedal, but not the rest of the parts that are smaller. A good part is that my concept is very simple. It just has to move automatically or semi-automatically a little, and I am not sure how to do that.

1. If some of the mechanical parts of the invention is a bit deficient or unclear, can it still go through the patent office, AND prevent the companies from stealing my idea by making the details a bit more clear and filing their own patent? (i.e. I have no idea how to motorize a part, or haven't seen the blueprint of pre-existing products)

2. I don't have much money I can spend right now. Is getting a service from patent attorneys or engineers still recommended?

3. Has anyone used Stephen Key(InventRight)'s service before? (Home - InventRight)

4. Do companies commonly help licensing inventors to develop their ideas further into reality and file the non-provisional patent for you, if they want to move forward with your idea?

5. Any other advice you can give me please?

Thank you in advance.
 
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Woodsman81

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4. Do companies commonly help licensing inventors to develop their ideas further into reality and file the non-provisional patent for you, if they want to move forward with your idea?

From the book one simple idea. Your goal should be to get them to pay for your utility patent as good faith that they are going to move forward with your product. In your licensing agreement you want to stipulation that you own all improvements made to the design.
 

Ajay Sewsankar

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From the book one simple idea. Your goal should be to get them to pay for your utility patent as good faith that they are going to move forward with your product. In your licensing agreement you want to stipulation that you own all improvements made to the design.


How do we go about contacting these companies for our ideas? For example, who do we have to email or call to get our ideas heard for them to “faithfully” pay for our utility patent. I myself have a great idea and do not know where to go to bring life to it. There are companies that can greatly benefit from my idea. Or I can create my own platform to incorporate my idea. But either route. I just don’t understand which direction to go and how to do so. I would appreciate your help with this also. Great advice given to the thread though! Definitely didn’t consider negotiating another company to pay for the patent.
 
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Woodsman81

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How do we go about contacting these companies for our ideas? For example, who do we have to email or call to get our ideas heard for them to “faithfully” pay for our utility patent. I myself have a great idea and do not know where to go to bring life to it. There are companies


Before you do anything I highly recommend reading One Simple Idea. It is all about licensing your products. Here is a short version.
Google patents is a great resource to see if someone has already patented the idea. Don't forget to do some market research before wasting allot of time on something that is already out there or no one wants.

To start you're going to want to make a sell sheet that explains your idea. Inventright TV on YouTube has some great examples of how to do this.
You are going to have to find companies that produce similar products. Make a list of these companies go on to linked in, and try to find names of people in marketing. That is who you are ideally going to want to contact.
The last thing you're going to want to do before you start contacting companies is to file for a provisional patent. This will allow you to put patent pending on your stuff for 1 year. You want to do it last because it only grants you one year of protection.
Then you're going to need to start cold calling companies try to get through to someone in marketing, and emailing them your sell sheet.

Good luck let me know if you start a progress thread.
 

Ajay Sewsankar

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Before you do anything I highly recommend reading One Simple Idea. It is all about licensing your products. Here is a short version.
Google patents is a great resource to see if someone has already patented the idea. Don't forget to do some market research before wasting allot of time on something that is already out there or no one wants.

To start you're going to want to make a sell sheet that explains your idea. Inventright TV on YouTube has some great examples of how to do this.
You are going to have to find companies that produce similar products. Make a list of these companies go on to linked in, and try to find names of people in marketing. That is who you are ideally going to want to contact.
The last thing you're going to want to do before you start contacting companies is to file for a provisional patent. This will allow you to put patent pending on your stuff for 1 year. You want to do it last because it only grants you one year of protection.
Then you're going to need to start cold calling companies try to get through to someone in marketing, and emailing them your sell sheet.

Good luck let me know if you start a progress thread.


Thank you very much for explaining how to get started. I really appreciate your feedback. I did view the inventright tv sell sheet video. Very informational. First from what I understand, I need to do market search online as well as a google patent search. Next I need to work on my design and sell sheet. Then review it with a graphic designer. And then file for the provisional patent good for one year. Finally, begin calling the companies I managed to find within the spectrum of my product.

Question headed your way. How do I file for the provisional patent? Is there a specific company or multiple companies? If so, which one do you recommend that is safe. I am worried that before filing the patent I would need to hire a patent attorney to do a full scale patent search and then move forward. But is there a risk to the patent filing company just taking my idea? And denying my provisional patent. I have a good business idea. But it’s not going to be rudimentary to changing the world or anything. It may though.

But thank again for your feedback. This was extremely helpful. I didn’t think this forum would get me anywhere really. But being my first forum. I appreciate everything.

Also you stated to start a progress thread once I begin my process. How do I go about doing so? Sorry for all the questions in random places.
 

Woodsman81

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Question headed your way. How do I file for the provisional patent? Is there a specific company or multiple companies? If so, which one do

Sorry @Ajay Sewsankar I am a rookie at this too. So I don't want to give you bad advice. I started on licensing a product before reading one simple idea and made a few mistakes. I didn't know about the book at that time. One of those mistakes was hiring a patent attorney Stephen Key recommends doing your provisional patent yourself, and your patent search.
Search the fast lane forums for Steven Key all his posts are about licensing your products.
Also you stated to start a progress thread once I begin my process. How do I go about doing so?
Apperantly if you don't know how to start a thread you have not introduced yourself. This is a great time to do so. You can use the tool bar on the top left of the home page to do so.
 

Ajay Sewsankar

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Sorry @Ajay Sewsankar I am a rookie at this too. So I don't want to give you bad advice. I started on licensing a product before reading one simple idea and made a few mistakes. I didn't know about the book at that time. One of those mistakes was hiring a patent attorney Stephen Key recommends doing your provisional patent yourself, and your patent search.
Search the fast lane forums for Steven Key all his posts are about licensing your products.

Apperantly if you don't know how to start a thread you have not introduced yourself. This is a great time to do so. You can use the tool bar on the top left of the home page to do so.


Thank you for not leading me to bad advice. I appreciate your honesty and your advice to look into Stephen Key's posts and his book. Also my apologies about the progress thread confusion. I was under the assumption there was a specific way to post a progress thread on this forum and was looking for a way to navigate to it when i was ready to begin. But thank you for your replies, you have absolutely helped me in many ways already. Stay tuned, that progress thread will be coming soon.
 
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TedM

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How do I file for the provisional patent?
Go to the US patent office website and look it up.

I worked with the InventRight team for a year and it was great. If you have the money, then do it.

The process is very very simple. It just takes a lot of persistence and discipline.
Here is the whole process:
  1. Develop idea.
  2. Create sell sheet. (Use vendors from Fiverr or UpWork who can cheaply do 3D renderings for you - use these illustrations for your sell sheet and for your patent application.
  3. Research a list of target companies, who could potentially license from you. go broad - get at least 25 companies in your list - put into a spreadsheet with contact names, phone numbers, website, etc.
  4. File Provisional Patent Application.
  5. Start contacting your list, call people, send them your sell sheet.
  6. Aggressively follow up until everyone says no... or you get a nibble.
  7. Listen carefully to feedback from the companies - see if you can incorporate it into your design/patent. Resubmit a PPA if need be.
  8. Start again with Idea #2
If you put 1-2 hours/day into it, you should get through a cycle in 2 months, pretty much.
 

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