Perpetual Innovation

Category: Patents

  • Putting Pen to Paper with Patent Innovation

    When you think about images of the first writing instruments, you envision charcoal, paint brushes and quill pens. The image of Shakespeare dipping a quill pen into an ink well come to mind. The ink smeared, it blotched and it took time to dry. You know the sign of a writer by the ink all over their hands (and their poverty, of course). The poverty part is still true, about the starving writer, right?

    There are many key inventions related to the pen, but none so significant as the ball-point pen. The most significant developments involving the ballpoint pen can be traced to Hungarian inventor László Jozsef Bíró. Stephen Brackman provides a great history of ball-point invention and the patent history at IPWatchdog.

    The reason that anyone and everyone ended up with dozens of pens is because of 

     Bic. Marcel Bich (company name was shortened to Bic) was the key player in this mass production product bringing the pen down to $1 or so per pen from hundreds of dollars per pen (converted to current price equivalents). Bic licensed the patent technology from Bíró, and also had a couple design patents.

    A great article about the evolution of the ball-point pen is presented in BBC by Stephen Dowling (Oct 29, 2020). As you read through, read through this exceptional history, think about the monks copying books by hand, and how far and how fast we have moved forward with the printing press, the pen, the mail.  All still in use today. (Well, not the original printing presses…)

    Another fun article is about other patents in the ink printing space. Here are 5 Fascinating Pen Patents at the Fun Facts section of Jet Pens. You want to read and look at the pix!:-) Here are the 5 patents:

    • Pilot Frixion Erasable Gel Ink Pen. That’s right, you write in this special ink and the eraser erases it. (Kinda, thermal makes the ink invisible.)
    • Fisher Space Pen. The pen that has pressurization, so it works up-side-down and in space.
    • Lamy Dialog 3 Fountain Pen. This fountain pen retracts and then a solid ball covers the nib so it doesn’t dry or leak.
    • Field Notes Color Cover Memo Book, Expedition Edition. This specialized book has Yupo synthetic paper that is waterproof, tear-proof and 100% recyclable. So this is not really a pen, but for a pen to work, you do need paper. You will want to take this book and your space pen on your Himalayan adventure.
    • Sakura Gelly Roll Gel Ink Pens. The ink in these pens has metallic and glitter. Since the ball-point pen works on the idea of a very smooth, even flow of ink, this is an interesting technology to achieve. 
    Even with the invent of the computer, there are times when you want to, or need to, write. Studies show that you retain information better when you right them down, even if you don’t revisit the notes. You retain better with handwritten notes than typed notes. 

    What do you think are other great pen, or writing related, inventions?
    What do you think is the next great, or not so great, invention related to the mighty pen?

  • Efficient Infringement 2: Which is Bigger Toll? EI or Patent Troll?

    In
    Part 1 on February 13, “    Inequality
    finds a place in IP where Efficient Infringement Runs Wild    ,”
    we emphasized the David vs Goliath nature of patent holding startups trying to
    get justice against a mega-tech infringer. 
    Infringement is somehow legally transformed because it is efficient – an
    odd attempt at rationalizing an illegal action. (Note the new location of our
    IP Zine and all past blog posts are at     www.IntellZine.com.) 
    Well, just as we acknowledge that, “hope springs
    eternal,” as Apple’s appeal in an infringement case was rejected (Bloomberg/LA
    Times, Feb 24, 2020).  The US Supreme
    Court refused to consider the tech giant’s attempt to avoid paying upwards of
    $1B in patent damages to VirnetX Holding Company, a Nevada company with less
    than $2M in annual revenue.  VirnetX
    somehow managed to tough it out for a decade trying to get Apple to pay
    royalties on patents for secure communications technology.
    Of
    the long list of things to fix in IP law, efficient infringment is certainly
    one of them.  Somehow, infringement cases
    must be settled far more rapidly than today’s decade long slogging through the
    mud.  The market disappears in ten years,
    there is no longer revenue available to fight over.
    From The LA Times, “The high court denied Apple’s
    petition arguing that a $439-million judgement from the first of two cases
    brought by VirnetX was ‘grossly excessive’ and should be thrown out… A second
    case not currently before the high court, resulted in a $503-million verdict
    over the same patents and newer Apple products.” (    https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/story/2020-02-24/apple-rebuffed-supreme-court-billion-facetime-patent)  
    This ruling was nearly one month after a federal jury
    in Los Angeles ruled that Apple and Broadcom must pay $1.1B in damages to
    Caltech for infringing on WiFi patents.  That’s
    right, California Institute of Technology (    http://www.caltech.edu/),
    the university in Pasadena California! What’s a school gonna do with patent
    technology anyway? Apple was ordered to pay $837M, Broadcom Inc $270.2M.  “It’s the biggest jury verdict of any kind so
    far in 2020 and the sixth largest patent verdict of all time, according to
    Bloomberg data.” (    https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2020-01-29/caltech-wins-a-1-1-billion-jury-verdict-against-apple-and-broadcom)
    Apple’s strategy is based on maintaining the Company’s high profit margin which
    demands fighting for years in various courts. 
    Does “efficient infringement” ring a bell here?  (The $838M won by Caltech is about one day of
    sales and 1.5% of the company’s $55.3B net profit in 2019.)
    Apple and Broadcom lose Caltech infringement case
    But wait, there’s more. Apple’s appeal to the US
    Supreme Court did not go well for Apple. On March 13, 2020, the US Supreme
    Court rejected the opportunity to review the case (originating in Texas, of
    course). The final settlement that Apple agreed to pay was $454M to VirnetX.  Now down to about half a day of sales and
    0.8% of the company’s net profit in 2019. Roughly $1 for each of the 400M
    devices that VirnetX claims patent infringement. (See     here
    for one discussion of case-closed.)
    So, Apple argues, essentially, “efficient infringement”,
    which we will return to in a second. But VirnetX has been ungraciously referred
    to as a Patent Troll, a Nevada corporation operating out of a Troll Hole in
    Texas. Here’s an example of articles during the decade by Zack Epstein in the
    NY Post:     https://nypost.com/2018/04/11/apple-ordered-to-pay-half-a-billion-dollars-in-damages-to-patent-troll/
    Patent
    Trolls    . The more derogatory term, but sometimes more
    accurate, is patent troll; other
    related terms are patent holding company
    (PHC), patent assertion entity (PAE),
    and non-practicing entity (NPE).
    Wikipedia has a good, but not especially strong, page on     Patent Trolls.
    The advantage of going back to Wikipedia is that it is dynamic and usually is
    updated perpetually by people. This Apple case is in the article, but not
    updated for 2020. Anyone can update, so please consider going and improving the
    article.
    There is the dilemma to choose between the lesser of
    two evils: the     toll
    of the patent troll     or the stealth of efficient infringement.  It
    is hard to support VinnetX, and the tolls of patent trolls.  Our values state that deliberate attempts to
    extort money on less-than-honorable pretenses cannot be condoned.  We have     several
    blogs posts about Patent Troll     and their negative
    impact on innovation and economic productivity. 
    On the other hand, efficient
    infringement     is the result of a deliberate – with malice of foresight –
    corporate strategy.  It is callous and
    predatory.  It is practiced by companies
    that are unquestioned technical powers and have major share in their
    markets.  They have uncommon market power
    and use it with against rivals.  In
    particular, these companies prey on start-up entrepreneurs if their new
    technology is a threat or an opportunity.
    Neither party is honorable in any way, but the greater
    of the evils is efficient infringement. 
    It would be a more positive impact on innovation if efficient
    infringement became too expensive by way of damages to risk continued
    practices.  The courts need to look just
    at the question of infringement and the issue of market power to make this
    call.
    These efficient infringement courtroom dramas go on
    and on, and on and on. A decade in this case. 
    Get the picture?  As one of
    several high-tech giants that are apparently doing the same, Apple doesn’t
    anticipate any significant downside. 
    When served a rare injunction, it just moves up the justice stepladder
    until, if necessary, it reaches the summit. 
    To be sure, The Supreme Court’s refusal to hear its appeal must have
    come as a shock.  But, will this change
    behavior?  Not likely.
    Here is another way to cast a harsh spotlight on
    efficient infringement.  The House of
    Representatives should hold hearings when these cases like these reach the
    public eye.  The CEO of the infringing
    company must be subpoenaed to testify whether or not efficient infringement is an accepted corporate policy; does the
    company’s board and CEO approve infringement and willingly will pay damages,
    eventually.  Today, a CEO can hide behind
    legions of lawyers. Being forced to testify in person just might, might change
    strategy.  In addition, Congress should
    make egregious efficient infringement a
    felony, Grand Theft – Intellectual Property punishable by 5-7 years in prison
    and forfeiture of revenues and fines for the key decision maker(s): Chair, CEO
    and CFO.  When enforced, efficient infringement will become a
    relic of a lesser past.
    Here is an afterthought. It is obvious that corporate
    lobbying and campaign contributions have removed any possibility of
    Congressional action to strongly deal with infringement today.  As the economy reopens, many things will
    change.  It would very much benefit the
    entrepreneur if the legal system enforced IP laws to protect the new technology
    inventions we will need.
    #Patents #EfficientInfringement #Infringement
    #PatentTroll #Apple #PAE #NPE

  • Cool Motor that Runs on Air

    A lot like a perpetual motor: no fool’n.
    As a kid, college really, I was intrigued about the idea of a “perpetual” motor. A motor that ran forever. My idea seemed like it should work, but I had a hard time getting someone to explain why it wouldn’t. My idea was based on the flywheel of the single engine Briggs & Stratton where a magnet on the flywheel creates the spark for the ignition on each rotation. My idea was to have magnets that attract the flywheel and a reverse magnet to repel the flywheel once it got past. But I had the problem that the flywheel would get attracted and stuck. So I found something called paramegnetic materials, materials that repel both positive and negative magnetic forces. All I needed, then is to have a thin sheet of paramagnetic material pass between the attracting magnets to let the flywheel move on to the repelling magnet. Perfect, a perpetual motor.
    I finally got to talk with a Physics professor at USF who explained my small, but subtle issue with the perpetuity of my motor. When you use a magnet, you loose a magnet. It took energy to magnetize a magnet, so the process of using it will deplete it!
    For decades, there have been articles about perpetual motors… But generally they have gone the way of “cold fusion”.
    Here is a very cool article/technology on a motor that runs on air. Liquefied Nitrogen, actually. Very cool. Literally, about -210 C (or -340 F). So, if the internal combustion motor works on the temperature differential before the ignition of fuel and after ignition, the liquid nitrogen concept works in the same way: from really really cold, to cold. Not nearly the same as the 1,000 times differential from gasoline, but still an effective motor. Effective only once you overcome the problem of things freezing up in the process.
    So here’s the great Wired article by Nicola Twilley about the inventor Peter Dearman: A One-Time Poultry Farmer Invents the Future of
    Refrigeration: Mechanical cooling revolutionized the global food supply—and
    accelerated global warming. Peter Dearman’s liquid air engine could change all
    that.
    The thing that Dearman had to overcome is to bring the temp of the super cold nitrogen up enough that it didn’t freeze up the works. (Kind of a reverse of the radiator idea to cool the motor down.)
    So the motor works, not especially efficient, but it works.
    However, your favorite internal combustion engine is very inefficient. Your car is only about 15% efficient. Diesel turbine motors for electricity are generally about 40% efficient, at best… Unless… Unless you need the excess heat. So if you can use the heat, like hot water on a campus environment, then the combined heat and power (CHP) can be very efficient, maybe up to about 70%.
    Imagine if you could use the cool from a liquid nitrogen engine? Say, hypothetically, for refrigerated storage or reefer. (No, not a Jimmy Buffet kind of Reefer!:-) A refrigerated reefer truck.
    And, wa la. You have a really great method of efficiently transporting and simultaneously cooling perishable products.
    The cryogenic reefer truck seems to be really gaining traction (sorry about the pun) within several food chains.
    Very cool!
    Dearman says the nitrogen solution will result in a 40% improvement over diesel in terms of greenhouse gases. If is the nitrogen is liquefied (chilled) by renewable energy the improvement compared to diesel moves up to 95%.
    Even Cooler!
    It also helps to overcome the need for Freon or the replacements for Freon. (Fluorocarbons are a wicked greenhouse gas that blow holes in the ozone layer.)
    With 78% of the Earth’s atmosphere, nitrogen (N) is readily abundant.
    Dearman has several patents related to cryogenics and cryogenic motors.
    Interestingly, it would appear that the same Peter (T?) Dearman is also the inventor of respirators and ventilators back in 1990!

  • Inequality in Efficient Infringement

    Inequality Finds a Place in Intellectual Property (IP) where Efficient Infringement Runs Wild
    Well established. Well understood. Great wealth creates great inequality. Wealth creates its own space, and maintains exclusivity by keeping others out.
    Here, a different view is taken of the inequality condition.  It is a perspective based on corporate wealth – aka corporate greed – masquerading as producing shareowner value.  It is almost axiomatic that when a company scores a major – no, “outstanding” – market success it is compelled to keep the great successes going.  A few outstanding successes include:  Apple’s iPhone, Google’s search engine and ad, Microsoft’s Windows, Ford’s F150, IBM’s Watson, and Coke Cola Company’s Coke.  Companies with successes like these are faced with a profound dilemma: what is the follow-on major winner that produces profits and increased shareowner value?
    CEOs of high tech companies, of consumer product companies, of logistics companies, of pharmaceutical companies, of medical device and drug companies have for the last several decades looked to their Intellectual Property assets as a source of answers to the follow-on question.  Research and Development (R&D) leading to new inventions and products is frequently the best source of value-added enhancement to an established offering, and consequently, to the opportunity to create a new market.  This is, however, the cost causing method as R&D is a heavy burden in most companies and while success can be magnificent, failure is also a possibility.
    A patent system can be strong or it can be weak.  Unfortunately, the US has gone from strong to weak over the past fifteen years.  In a strong system, there is a “presumption of validity” wherein the patent holder’s rights are protected against infringement: infringers are punished and patents are not subject to constant attack in the courts or the Patent Office (USPTO).  In a strong system, investors are far more likely to invest in a product when it has patent protection.  Most new jobs are created by young companies and the majority need funding – especially if they are disruptive and fast-growing.
    A strong patent system is what you should think of as the “play by the rules” method or process of gaining new corporate revenues and market success.  It is conducted on a level playing field.
    In contrast, a weak system is basically the opposite.  The courts tend to rule against the patent holder, established competitors ignore the innovator’s patent and engage in what is termed “efficient infringement” utilizing long, drawn out court processes the innovator cannot afford.  Large and well-established high-tech companies have led the strong-to-weak downward slide by lobbying congress and funding campaigns which resulted in the American Invents Act (AIA) of 2011.  “Google spent $18M on lobbyists the year the AIA was passed…Google wanted a weak patent system because it already dominated the search and internet advertising in 2012…with a 67% market share.  Today, (2018), with a weaker patent system firmly in place and no fear of any innovating competition protected by patents, Google’s market share has increased to almost 80%.”  (Shore, M., 2018, Mar 21, How Google and Big Tech Killed the U.S. Patent System, IPwatchdog.com)
    “Efficient infringement occurs when a company deliberately chooses to infringe a patent because it is cheaper to fight off a legal challenge from an inventor than it is to license the patent.  This practice is especially harmful to small inventors and innovators and it undermines our broader innovation economy.”  (Save the American Inventor, 2019, May 21, www.SaveTheInventor.com)
    In selected circles, this is stated as “efficient infringement is a ‘fiduciary responsibility’ when the costs are less than those in R&D plus product development.”  Huh!  What? Really? Is this saying that Effective Infringement is legal?  It is Stealing!  It is the startup in a garage inventor versus a mega high-tech corporation with very deep pockets taking and using the invention.  The term “infringing” originally applied to a situation where a company accidentally or inadvertently used the same technology (techniques, methods, algorithm, signaling, coding) as the patent what the patent owner claimed (and may have been granted rights to in an issued patent).  In such cases, when the patent owner discovered the infringement, he went to court and got an injunction against the infringer – as cease and desist order.  In most instances, the outcome of follow-on negotiations was that the infringer paid some settlement for past infringement, took a license to the patent, and paid royalties for future sales (usually until the patent expired).
    A strong patent system sounds rather quaint in view of today’s infringement-as-a-corporate-strategy where the infringer drags the patent owner through the courts for years until the inventor and his funding are exhausted.  Here is yet another example of wealth inequality where those with money disadvantage those without.  “Try to assert a patent covering the technology being copied and the Gang of Five will simply petition the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) dragging the patent through inter partes and deveining it of any useful subject matter if the proceedings are instituted.”  (Brachmann, S., 2017, March 17, How tech’s ruling class stifles innovation with efficient infringement, IPWatchdog.com). Gang of Five refers to Google (Alphabet), Apple, Facebook, Microsoft and Amazon.
    Meanwhile, back in Washington, DC, Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC), Chair of the Senate’s Subcommittee on IP, said the Committee would not be able to complete its work on legislation addressing patent eligibility.  “[A]bsent stakeholder consensus, I don’t see a path forward for producing a bill – much less steering it to passage – in this Congress.”  There is no mention of considering strengthening injunctions or treating efficient infringement as the crime it is.  (Borella, M., Feb. 4, 2020, The Zombie Apocalypse of Patent Eligibility Reform and a Possible Escape Route, www.patentdocs.org)
    High tech gets to run free without restraint for at least another year.  Hey look, it’s a fiduciary responsibility.

  • Potatoes and Patents

    Patents, Potatoes and Pomegranates 
    “I remember thinking- there cannot be anything clever in delivering beans…”  That was the reaction of Lucy Wojcik in 2014 being interviewed for the job of IP attorney at Ocado, an online supermarket company in the United Kingdom.
    It does furrow eyebrows when considering the part, if any, IP would play in a company that grows vegetables and fruits and then distributes them as meals, but now Ms Wojcik has a decidedly different view, https://patentstrategy.managingip.com/Articles/110?from=daily.  As she came to find out even in the supermarket business, “… as soon as you have problems that need solutions and engineers, you are generating IP.”
    The Ocado and its emphasis on IP serves as today’s model of how to maintain a competitive presence today and tomorrow.  With very few exceptions, a company today needs a strong R&D/IP culture to survive.  It must be an integral of the conduct of business, a primary consideration in company strategic planning.  It should be the source of new, competitive products and services as well as the mechanisms for protecting those products from competitive inroads.  A comprehensive tour de force for the “how to” is Perpetual Innovation™ A guide to Strategic Planning. Patent Commercialization and Enduring Competitive Advantage by Hall & Hinkelman available at Amazon and Lulu.
    Perpetual innovation™ Patent Guide & Patent Primer: http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/SBPlan