A unique program to connect low-income inventors with patent attorneys to pursue patents before the US Patent and Trademark Office was announced today in Denver by David Kappos, the director of the US Patent Office.
“It is the first time ever in the world that a group of patent attorneys have gotten together – organized – to set up a program by which inventors who have great ideas but don’t have financial resources can get matched up with practicing patent attorneys who will research their inventions, counsel them, write patent applications, and file those patent applications in the US patent office,” said Kappos.
The patent lawyers will then pursue the patents for the inventor all the way through the patent office to obtain the patents, said Kappos.
“This is the first time ever such a program has been set up,” said Kappos.
“The inventors can then use those to build businesses.”Once you get a patent the whole world is your oyster,” said Kappos.
“Once you get a patent you can talk to sources of funding, venture capitalists, angel investors, you can go license your invention to a company that actually wants to build it. You can sell your invention. Your patent is a carrier of value of the invention,” he added.
Kappos said the patent becomes a very important commercial instrument which enables the inventor to turn an idea into innovation and from an innovation to a product or service in the market.
The project, called the Colorado Pro Bono Patent Initiative, is an effort by the US Patent Office, the Colorado Bar Association Intellectual Property Section, the Mi Casa Resource Center to connect low income Colorado inventors with Colorado patent professionals for patent preparation and legal service. The service would be on a pro bono or significantly reduced fee basis with its aim being to continue to support and advance Colorado’s economic success.
Kappos said the Denver program is the outgrowth of a pilot project in Minneapolis.
Howard Pankratz: 303-954-1939 or hpankratz@denverpost.com
