So You've Got A Patent!

Jane Lambert

Congratulations! It probably took a little longer to get than you expected. It almost certainly cost you more money than you had bargained for.  But so long as you pay the renewal fees you have an asset that is bound to make your fortune. Right?

Well, not exactly. You have a right to stop other people from making, marketing, importing or selling something that you have invented but a patent is not a meal ticket. It exists to give you an opportunity to recoup the time and money you spent in devising the invention and perhaps a little extra on the side either by working the patent yourself or by licensing it to others. Whether you can do that or not will depend on whether anybody wants to buy your invention.

If there is a market for the invention, there is always a possibility that somebody will want to muscle in. Such a person may want to do it fairly by seeking a licence from you or by using a technology that does not infringe your patent, but there are also those who would try to sweep your patent out of the way in revocation or declaration of non-infringement proceedings or simply ignore your patent if they don't think you can afford to enforce it.  Unlike some other intellectual property rights such as copyright, trade marks, rights in performances or, nowadays, registered designs, it is not an offence to infringe a patent in this country even if it is done quite blatantly, cynically and on an industrial scale.

If anyone infringes your patent you have to sue and patent litigation is not cheap. You can't use the small claims track of the Intellectual Property Enterprise Court ("IPEC") because the rules specifically exclude patents, registered and registered Community designs, semiconductor topography and plant variety claims from that tribunal.  You can use the IPEC multitrack but you have to be prepared to pay up to £50,000 if you lose the case and probably a great deal more than that to your own legal team. That is a lot better than the Patents Court where the costs that can be awarded against you are unlimited and can run into millions.

So unless you are a millionaire, your company is really coining it or you have some other source of funding you should consider before-the-event insurance cover against IP disputes before a dispute arises (see my article It is never enough to get a patent, trade mark or registered design 19 Aug 2019 and my links to other articles). It is unrealistic to expect a lawyer specializing in IP to represent you on a no-win no-fee basis because the risks, costs and wait for payment are too great however strong your case. IP insurance is not cheap but it is a lot better than bankruptcy or watching a competitor ride roughshod over your rights.

So, what should you do if you think that someone is infringing your patent? Well, one thing you should not do is take matters in your own hands and write a stroppy letter to the other side. S.70 of the Patents Act 1977 and subsequent sections prohibit threats of patent infringement proceedings that cannot be made out. If you make such a threat (however politely) you risk an action for an injunction, declaration and costs that could cost you plenty. Any lawyer or patent attorney with any experience of patent litigation will be aware of this section but many non-specialist lawyers aren't. If they make a groundless threat on your behalf it is you who will have to carry the can.

Where do you find a specialist lawyer? Any firm that belongs to the Intellectual Property Lawyers Association should be able to help you. There are good solicitors in other firms but you have to be careful because not every solicitor who claims experience of IP has actually done a patent case.  Another possible option is a patent attorney litigator.  Not every patent attorney has expertise in civil litigation but there is a growing number who have. The CIPA and IPReg websites should help you find one. Yet another option is to consult a member of the IP Bar. We are advocates and not litigators but we are probably in a better position than most to recommend a good litigator.

Civil proceedings begin with the service or delivery of a claim form on the alleged wrongdoer.  The claim form is usually accompanied by another document known as particulars of claim. Those particulars must state the facts on which you base your claim and the remedy that you want precisely. In a patent infringement claim, your particulars of claim must state which of the claims of your patent is alleged to have been infringed and give at least one example of at least one alleged infringement.  The "claims" are the numbered paragraphs at the end of your patent specification setting out the features of your invention.  The reason they are set out in numbered paragraphs is that if one of them is too broad you may still be able to rely on one of the others. If your invention is a product the patent is infringed by making, marketing, importing or using a product that has all the features of at least one of the claims.

It is possible that the alleged infringer will accept the strength of your case and seek a settlement or simply throw in the towel but you cannot bank on that. He or she may challenge your interpretation of the claim and argue that his or her product falls outside its wording,  It is likely that he or she will dispute the validity of the patent on one of several grounds.  If your opponent can show that someone else invented exactly the same thing before you applied for your patent can be revoked (taken away) on the grounds that your invention was not new. Another possible ground for revocation is that your invention would have been obvious to anyone with the appropriate skills and knowledge having regard to everything that was known at the time of your application.  You might think that all this would have been considered by the examiner when you applied for your patent but the sad fact is that the time and resources that are available to an examiner are nothing like the time and resources that your opponent will expend in order to knock out your patent.  A surprisingly large number of patents are revoked in whole or in part when patentees bring infringement claims.

If you win your action you will be awarded an injunction and a contribution to your legal fees which will be limited to £50,000 if you brought your claim in IPEC.  You would probably get more if you sue in the Patents Court but even the awards in that court are unlikely to cover everything you spent. An injunction is an order by a judge to do or not to do something. If it is disobeyed the court may punish the defendant with a fine or even imprisonment.  What you will not get at this stage is damages or accountable profits.  That will require another hearing known as an account or inquiry which may take place several months or even a year or so in the future. That will also cost a lot of money,

There is obviously a lot more to patent enforcement than I can mention in a short note.  The important thing is to think about enforcement and arrange to fund it whether by insurance or otherwise well before a dispute arises. If you want to discuss this article or anything relating to it, call me on 020 7404 5252 or send me a message through my contact form.

The Role of the Translator

Pieter Bruegel "Tower of Babel"    Source Wikipedia

If you want a patent for your invention you have to persuade the Intellectual Property Office  that the invention is new and involves an inventive step {see s.1 (1) (a) (b) Patents Act 1977).  S.2 (1) provides that invention shall be taken to be new if it does not form part of the state of the art.  S.3 also refers to the state of the art when explaining what us meant by an inventive step:

"An invention shall be taken to involve an inventive step if it is not obvious to a person skilled in the art, having regard to any matter which forms part of the state of the art by virtue only of section 2(2) above (and disregarding section 2(3) above)."

The term state of the art is one that is used frequently by advertisers and others well outside patent law but what exactly does the phrase mean?

State of the Art

For the purpose of this discussion I shall take the definition provided by s.2 (2) as 

"all matter (whether a product, a process, information about either, or anything else) which has at any time before the priority date of that invention been made available to the public (whether in the United Kingdom or elsewhere) by written or oral description, by use or in any other way."

It is actually slightly broader than that but we can put that to one side for today. It is everything that has been made available to the public by written or oral description by use or in any other way anywhere in the world. That includes patents and patent applications of course but also academic papers, brochures catalogues, data sheets, web pages - you name it.  And - and this is the crucial bit - the disclosure does not have to be in English. If in some sleepy Swiss canton or the back streets of Algiers someone has anticipated your invention or come so close to your invention that your invention  is obvious you won't get a patent or, if you do get a patent, your grant could be revoked.  As Tommy Cooper used to say: "Just like that."

How to protect yourself
So what do you do about it? Well search! Search as many relevant patents and patent applications as you can. Search also the technical and trade literature. And not just in English. If you happen to know of an academic working in the same field at a Swiss University in some idyllic mountain valley the good professor is likely to publish his results in German.  If your competitor trades in Algiers his first foreign language is likely to be French and that's the language in which he will publish his brochures and data sheets.

But we Brits are very bad linguists. Most of us do French and possibly German up to GCSE and then drop it for A" levels in something else. That is not enough to make sense of a patent specification or article. So what next? Well here's where Alison (or someone like her) comes in.

Alison Penfold
Alison is a freelance technical translator specializing in patents and other intellectual property work. Her languages are French and German and she also knows some Dutch. She is an Associate Member of the Institute of Translation and Interpreting (AITI).  She read French, German and Linguistics at the University of East Anglia and rook a postgraduate diploma in translation and interpreting with distinction from the University of Kent. She worked for Lloyd Wise Tregear as a staff translator between 1987 and 2007 and then for Marks & Clerk between 2007 and 2009. Since then she has practised on her own account.

Revocation Proceedings 
You may also need a translator if you think you are sued or likely to be sued for patent infringement. If possible you will want to claim that the patent is invalid on the ground that the invention was anticipated or obvious having regard to the prior art.  At least some of the materials on which your lawyers or patent attorneys will rely are likely to be in a foreign language for which you will need a translation.

Further Information
If you want to discuss this article or patent law in general, call me on 020 7404 5252 during office hours or send me a message. You can also tweet me, write on my wall or contact me through G+, Linkedin or Xing.