Patrice LACOUTURE (GMail) wrote:
Gonz a écrit :
I don't know this -- does a foreign company need to take out patents
in the US for their proprietary stuff?
Yes, if they want protection in the US for their proprietary products.
Our company routinely files patents in the European Union, Japan, as
well as the US of course.
Yep, and this does really not help companies worldwide to protect their
Intellectual Property. Even more so for individuals.
And once a company owns a patent portfolio filed in a bunch of well
chosen countries, it must be taken care of, and all this means big $$$.
Europe is moving the right way in this regard.
Filing a patent in, say, China is still impractical (anyway, do you
*really* dream to sell to China?), but at least, you can protect your
invention in the countries you expect to sell it, and prevent imports of
counterfeit copies.
Bottom line: if me, as an individual, invent anything really worth
filing parents worldwide, I'd rather file it in my own country first if
I can afford it, then look for investors ready to back up with big $$$
only to protect the invention on a wider basis!
In the US you have about a year from public disclosure to the point of
patent application. In other countries, its usually less, down to the
point of public disclosure. So in many cases you would not get
protection if you waited for $$$ to apply.
--
Someone handed me a picture and said, "This is a picture of me when I
was younger." Every picture of you is when you were younger. "...Here's
a picture of me when I'm older." Where'd you get that camera man?
- Mitch Hedberg
