Patents no guarantee of wealth

A lot of people go after patents like lottery tickets. But acquiring an expensive patent — alone — is an even longer shot than the lottery at wealth, says Rita Heimes, director of a law center that oversees the Maine Patent Program in Portland.

Patents, granted by the U.S. Government for a limited period of time, are meant to exclude others from cashing in on an invention before the inventor can recover costs and make a profit. When the patent expires, the invention is then available to the public. This is in exchange for the protection received earlier under the patent.

According to Heimes, whose program is affiliated with the University of Maine School of Law, a patent itself doesn't make any money. "It's the product that meets a need that makes money," she explains.

So why are more than 300,000 patent applications made to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office each year?

"People understand that they have to protect their intellectual property," says Meriby Sweet, Director of the Maine Small Business & Technology Development Center (Maine SBTDC) in Gardiner. Each year, Sweet helps dozens of Maine inventors who are trying to bring a technology-based invention to market.

One of them is Dan Porter of Portland. His company, IdealsWork Financial (http://www.iwfinancial.com), has patents on two software applications. His newest software enables financial professionals to develop custom research from multiple data sources. This allows the advisor to match investment options with clients' social interests. For him, the need for a patent is simple: "Potential investors always ask if the invention is patented."

While a patent is no guarantee that other inventors can't write their way around it, he says, "There is a perception that you have not done your homework" if you don't have one.

Sweet has also worked with Cheryl Pitcher, who, with her husband owns Mercer Motor Works in Mercer (http://www.mmworks@tdstelme.net). Pitcher's husband, Terry, invented a machine that deploys and retrieves a special tarp system to provide daily cover required by law for landfills. Pitcher says that despite the expense, the patent gives the invention protection, and the research done in the process is valuable to assure that no one else has a similar idea patented.

Sweet agrees. "Don't fall for those late-night ads on TV that tell you to send money in now to protect your million-dollar idea!" warns Sweet.

She has seen inventors spend thousands of dollars to get a "patent" that is worthless. "You can't believe the hype on TV that owning a patent guarantees you the millions of dollars you will otherwise lose if you don't act right now," she says. This is precisely Heimes' "lottery ticket" concern.

However, an inventor can wait too long, says Sweet. If an invention has been "disclosed" in some way — published or sold or somehow made public — more than one year before the application has been filed, a patent will not be awarded.

Given the expense of the patent process, inventors need to proceed carefully and access the correct resources for help. Those resources include the Maine SBTDC Gardiner office and 10 other Maine Small Business Development Centers statewide (http://www.mainesbdc.org), the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Web site at http://www.uspto.gov, and the Maine Patent Program at 44 Oak Street in Portland or at http://www.tlc.usm.maine.edu/patent.

Although Pitcher says the Bangor patent attorney she used did an excellent job, she wishes she had started with the Maine Patent Program. "This is no cheap thing," she said.

She recommends getting all of the background available at the Maine Patent Program before you engage your own patent attorney. Willis "Woody" Higgins, who is one of few patent attorneys in Maine licensed to practice before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, is director of the Maine Patent Program.

The national small business development center clearinghouse at http://sbdcnet.utsa.edu and the Maine U.S. SBA office at http://www.sba.gov/me/ (click on "laws & regulations" and search "patent.") also provide patent information and other Internet links.

Using these resources will help the inventor assess the marketplace value of her product, establish realistic expectations of what a patent can do, improve the likelihood of obtaining the right patent, and then get that product to the marketplace where the real money can be made.

Katherine Arno is the Director of Training and Communications for the Maine Small Business Development Centers (www.mainesbdc.org) in its Portland center at the University of Southern Maine. Kate owned her own small business in Maine for eight years. Today, aside from working with small business issues at Maine SBDC, she helps her husband with the small business that he has owned in Freeport for 12 years. She can be reached at Karno@maine.edu.

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