Patent searches before prosecution help improve the defensibility of the future patent, and can dissuade the inventor from prosecuting at all. In our litigious society, the pre-examination preparation by an inventor, patent attorney, agent, or searcher can save the patent owner much time and money later on. But while quality patent searching is vital to intellectual property law, there are very few resources available on how an intellectual property professional should conduct a patent search. Patent Searching: Tools & Techniques provides a practical guide to the art and science of this task, along with essential information on patent law, patent search theory, and practice.
Editor David Hunt and his team of contributors at Landon IP, Inc.--one of the largest privately held patent search, analysis, and consulting firms in the United States--have drawn on their experience working for approximately 2,000 companies and 1,000 IP law firms to create an indispensable reference to patent searching procedures and techniques. They detail key principles and approaches that will work regardless of the specific tools you use, covering everything from the basic types of patent searches (including patentability, validity, infringement, clearance, state-of-the-art, and patent landscape) to the mechanics of searching, patent analysis, reporting search results, and more.
While the Internet has made simple searching easy, the volume of information available has in many ways made it less focused and harder to interpret findings. Patent Searching: Tools & Techniques helps professionals avoid information overload and identify just the information they need. It outlines criteria on how to select the most appropriate search tools and even provide current information on the major databases available. And with an abundance of illustrative tables, charts, and figures, this book makes complex material easy to read and understand.
Whether you're a patent examiner, patent attorney, commercial patent searcher, patent liaison, IP librarian, law professor, or competitive intelligence analyst, you'll find Patent Searching: Tools & Techniques to be just the guide you have been waiting for, with a range of approaches to patent searching that will be useful to you regardless of your technical expertise or role in the intellectual property community.
From the Back Cover
Praise for Patent Searching: Tools & Techniques"Hunt delivers a comprehensive yet readable treatise on patent searching. Laying out methods and tools to implement a systematic search process, Patent Searching elucidates the what, why, when, and how--a desirable contribution to those involved in this endeavor."
--Mark Hutcherson, Editor, Patent Information Users Group Newsletter
Patent Searching: Tools & Techniques provides an essential training and reference tool for patent attorneys, patent agents, and their support staff. David Hunt and his team of patent experts detail the methods used in the art of professional patent searching, the current tools to accomplish that task, and approaches for reporting that information. The wide range of search types they outline will yield invaluable data for any applicant who wants to increase their chances of earning a profitable return on a corporation's substantial investment. Along with search tools, this practical book covers a mixture of patent law, patent search theory, and practice, offering a global approach to patents that will be useful to attorneys and agents not just in the United States, but all around the world.
About the Author
David Hunt is the CEO and owner of Landon IP, Inc. He holds a BA and an MBA from the College of William & Mary and has worked as a senior manager in corporate strategy, market research, and competitive intelligence at the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (Freddie Mac) in McLean, Virginia. Mr. Hunt has served as a project manager at large and small companies in the information technology areas. He has considerable experience in operations management. Mr. Hunt is a member of PIUG and PATMG, which are the professional patent information users groups in the United States and England. He is a member of the International Trademark Association (INTA) as well as the Society for Competitive Intelligence Professionals (SCIP). Long B. Nguyen is the director of patent search quality for Landon IP, Inc. He holds an MS in engineering management from George Washington University, and a BS in mechanical engineering and a BA in economics from Syracuse University. Mr. Nguyen is a registered patent agent (No. 56,138) with several years of experience in patent prosecution at the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). While at the USPTO as a patent examiner, he examined technologies that included traction devices, wheels and axles, and tire inflation systems. Mr. Nguyen also has experience in business methods.
Matthew Rodgers is the vice president of the Patent Search Group for Landon IP, Inc. He holds a BS in mechanical engineering from the University of Texas at Austin. Mr. Rodgers has conducted research in semiconductor heat treatment and selective laser sintering. Additionally, he possesses significant experience in the analysis of metallurgical failure. Prior to joining Landon IP, Mr. Rodgers worked for several years as a patent examiner at the USPTO and as a technical specialist who conducted patent searches at other commercial patent search firms. He is a regular faculty member of the leading patent law training company, Patent Resources Group, Inc., of Charlottesville, Virginia.
