Companies all too often failed to understand that early action was crucial to protect new products and processes, said Anton Hutter, patent lawyer with Venner Shipley, speaking at an Innovation Day organised by Leatherhead Food Research last month.
"I frequently get people contacting me to try and get a patent for something that has already been on sale and I have to tell them they will not be granted one," he said. "An application has to be made well in advance of that.
"Vital"
"It is vital that people think at the very beginning of a process who are the inventors and who are the owners, especially in collaborative environments."
While invention belongs to the person who has the idea, ownership usually belongs to the employer, he added.
He acknowledged that the patent process was lengthy, cumbersome and expensive, especially if a firm was applying across national boundaries, but argued it could be highly lucrative in the long run.
"Without a patent in place early on, it can be very difficult for a company or individual to attract funding or investment," he added. "However, once it is in place, the company can use it as a bargaining chip in negotiations and gain kudos when seeking collaborations. It is a great asset."
Pitfalls
These positive attributions are all too often overlooked, he said, with many people focusing on the deterrent aspects of a patent, such as how it can create barriers to others entering the market.
"Many companies also make a vast amount of money from these positive attributions, such as licensing products or processes," he added.
Hutter also highlighted some of the pitfalls that prevented firms from being granted a patent. In addition to a product or process having"absolute novelty" and being a genuinely "inventive step" that must be capable of being applied in a practical setting, he said it was crucial that the process had not been showcased publicly on any level, let alone put on sale.
