I second Anthony's opinion, and I'm talking from experience.
Way back in the day when I actually worked for a living, my business
partner and I developed a process to make grains into chicken feed at
a price that the regular mills could not touch. It was natural and
better in every way. Some 8 months after applying for several
patents, Cdn, US, Japanese, Korean, and a few other I don't remember,
we find our process in a Korean science journal that was the same as
ours but used different devices for the actual process. To make a
long story short, 50K in the hole, nobody got a patent and the
Japanese and Korean hobby farms have been using the process ever since.
Robert
At 09:11 PM 9/29/2015, you wrote:
Tip of the iceberg. You can spend a lot more money than that to get a patent granted. Especially if it anything to do with anything relevant to the USML. The USPTO can and often does share the application with the DoD and other branches if they deem it relevant. Sometimes, nothing happens but sometimes things do. The back and fort can be quite consuming in terms of time and money. If everything goes your way, you get a patent and a nice plaque to hang on the wall. Time will only tell if it will make a return on your investment or just end up as a plaque on the wall. Now if it's a good patent and someone decides to violate your patent, you can expect to spend over $100k to litigate it in many cases and you better or walk away.
On the other hand, if you are a U.S. person and the DoD digs their heels in, there is a rarely used process that makes "classifying" your patent possible, in which case it may never publish for decades and you'll probably never know if it's been violated.
I have a wall covered with plaques. About 1 in 10 pays off as a general rule so if you want to play, be prepared to pay. Don't forget about those maintenance fees and foreign filings either. $$$$ One other thing, if it's ITAR/USML related, you require certificate from the state department to file in an ITAR free country who can do with it as they please otherwise. Have fun litigating that assuming you even get the patent. It took me 7 years to get my first Japanese patent. They publish the initial application and let everyone do a work around then finally grant it. Pretty patent though. Not a plaque. Looks like a beautiful menu from an expensive sushi restaurant.
Just my experience FWIW.
Best.
Anthony
Sent from my iPhone
> On Sep 29, 2015, at 10:31 PM, David Summers <dvidsum@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> Agreed, but we are already past that point... we've actually been
> funded for several years. If I can get a patent for 5 grand, I'd be
> very happy. My last work in getting patents cost me $20K!
>
> (I live in Chicago, the land of expensive lawyers)
>
> Thanks!
>
> David Summers
> Crew Marketing
>
> The John Hancock Center | 875 N. Michigan Avenue, Suite 3660 | Chicago, IL 60611
> P 312.994.2349 | F 312.994.2382 | dsummers@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>
>
> On Tue, Sep 29, 2015 at 9:07 PM, Monroe L. King Jr.
> <monroe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>> My advice take that 5 grand for starters and use it to fly and visit
>> potential investors. Go to conferences and meet people. Things like that
>>
>> Use it to make connections that will land you and investor.
>>
>> Landing an investor is more about connections.
>>
>> Just my 2 cents.
>>
>> Unless you have something really good and the investor has an interest
>> in backing your claim. Because patents take money to protect. If it's
>> not worth protecting then it's pretty much worthless.
>
>
