Novel approach to locate prior art

Locating close prior art provides a critical edge in patent litigation or licensing, by documenting that the patent in question should not have been granted due to anticipatory (102) or obviousness (103) art. However, the prior art defense is contingent upon successfully locating such art. as most law firms have discovered, there is a wide range of outcomes when a prior art search is commissioned. this is dramatically evident when a Joint defense Group commissions 3 searches and compares the results, only to find that while they purport to cover the same materials, the outcomes are dramatically different.

The challenge of assessing the quality of a search is difficult, since attorneys have no way of knowing what critical findings were missed. consequently, they tend to rely on proxies to gauge the quality of a search, e.g. the number of findings uncovered, the total number of databases reviewed, length of the search report, etc. However, there is no evidence that any of these factors correlate with search integrity.

Grace Period : Top Patent Offices

United States of America 

Disclosure not to be taken into consideration in determining novelty and inventive step if it occurred within one year before the filing date in the form of:
1. inventions patented or described in a printed publication in the US or abroad;
2. public use or on sale in the US.

India

An invention shall not be deemed to have been anticipated by:
1. Disclosures at any time before the filing date (priority date) of matter obtained from, and published without the consent of, the inventor or his successor in title (provided that the invention was not commercially worked in India, otherwise than for the purpose of reasonable trial, and that a patent application for the invention was filed in India or a convention country as soon as reasonably practicable thereafter).
2. Other applications made in contravention of the rights of the inventors or his successor in title or public use or publication of the invention without the consent of the inventor or his successor in title by the applicants of such other applications or by any other person in consequence of the disclosure.
3. Disclosures due to the communication of the invention to the Government or to any person authorized by the Government to investigate the invention or its merits, or for the purpose of that investigation.
4. Disclosures within 12 months before the application is made (calculated from the opening of the exhibition or the reading or publication of the paper) by:
(a) display or use of the invention with the consent of the inventor or his predecessor in title at an industrial or other exhibition notified in the Official Gazette;
(b) publication of the invention in consequence of such display or use;
(c) use of the invention during the period of the exhibition without the consent of the inventor or his predecessor in title;
(d) description of the invention in a paper read by the inventor before a learned society, or published with his consent in the transactions of such a society.
5. Disclosures within one year before the filing date (priority date) by public working the invention for reasonable trial, by or with the consent of the applicant or his predecessor in title.

Exclusion From Patentable Subject Matter: Japan & UK

Japan

1. Inventions contrary to public order, morality or public health.
2. Methods for the treatment of humans. 

United Kingdom

1. Discoveries, scientific theories and mathematical methods.
2. Literary, dramatic, musical and artistic works.
3. Aestheticcreations.
4. Schemes, rules and methods for performing mental acts, playing games or doing business. 5. Computer programs. 

6. Presentation of information.
7. Therapeutic, surgical and diagnostic methods for treating humans or animals. 8. Inventions contrary to public policy or morality. 

9. Plant and animal varieties and essentially biological processes for their production, other than:
(a) microbiological methods and products;
(b) inventions whose technical feasibility of the invention is not confined to a particular plant or animal variety;
(c) products consisting of or containing biological material;
(d) processes producing, processing or using biological material;
(e) biological material isolated from its natural environment or produced by a technical process, even if previously occurring in nature.
10. The human body, at any stage of its formation and development or the simple discovery of its elements, including gene sequences, other than elements isolated from the human body or produced by a technical process.
11. Processes for cloning humans; modifying the germ line genetic identity of humans; uses of human embryos for industrial or commercial purposes; and processes for modifying the genetic identity of animals which are likely to cause them suffering without any substantial medical benefit, and animals resulting from such processes.

Patent infringement

infringement constitute of illegal manufacturing, using or even offering for a sale or selling any patented invention within the country or its territories without proper license, or importing it into the country of any patented invention during the term of the patent protection.
 

Protection against Infringement may vary from country to country, as the patent is examined voluntarily by the patent office established in each country or region and may have some difference in patentability, so that a granted patent is difficult to carry out worldwide. In many countries, a use is mandatory to be commercial or to be for a commercial purpose so as to constitute infringement.

When infringement takes place, the filing agent may sue for its relief by Patent drafting in the concerned Federal court. The Patent filing agent may also ask court for a ban to prevent the continuation of the patent infringement and may also ask the court for reimbursement of damages occured due to the patent infringement.

Exclusions from Patentable Subject Matter - India

The exclusion from Patentable Subject Matter for India Patent Office are:

1. Inventions which are frivolous or obviously contrary to well established natural law.
2. Inventions use or commercial exploitation of which is contrary to law or morality or causes serious prejudice to human, animal, or plant life or health or to the environment.
3. Discoveries of a scientific principle or formulation of an abstract theory or discovery of any living thing or non- living substance occurring in nature.
4. Mere discovery of a new form of a known substance which does not enhance known efficacy, or the mere discovery of any new property or new use for a known substance or of the mere use of a known process, machine or apparatus unless such known process results in a new product or employs at least one new reactant.
5. Substance obtained by a mere admixture resulting only in the aggregation of the properties of the components thereof or a process for producing such substance.
6. Mere arrangement or re-arrangement or duplication of known devices each functioning independently in a known way.
7. Agricultural and horticultural methods.
8. Any processes for medicinal, surgical, curative, prophylactic , diagnostic, therapeutic or other treatments of humans or any process for a similar treatments of animals or plants to render them free of disease or increase economic value.
9. Plants and animals in whole or any part thereof other than microorganisms, but including seeds, varieties and species and essentially biological processes for production or propagation of plants and animals.
10. Mathematical or business method or a computer program per se or algorithms.
11. Literary, dramatic, musical or artistic work or any other aesthetic creation whatever.
12. Mere scheme or rule or method of performing mental act or method of playing game.
13. Presentation of information.
14. Topography of integrated circuits.
15. Invention which, in effect, is traditional knowledge or which is an aggregation or duplication of known properties of traditionally known component(s).
16. Inventions relating to atomic energy.

Prior art definition: Top Countries

United States of America 

1. An invention which was known or used by others in US, or patented or described in a printed publication in US or a foreign country, before the invention by the applicant;

2. An invention which was patented or described in a printed publication in US or a foreign country or in public use or on sale in US, more than one year before the filing date;

3. An invention abandoned by the applicant;

4. An invention which was patented, or was the subject of an inventor's certificate filed by applicant or his legal representatives or assignees in a foreign country more than 12 months prior to the filing date;

5. An invention which was described in a published US patent application by another or in a patent filed by another before the invention by the applicant (for the PCT international applications, only if they designate US and are published in English language);

6. During the course of interference, another inventor establishes that, before the invention date, he/she invented the invention and not abandoned, surpressed or concealed the invention; or another inventor made the invention in US before the invention date and he/she had not abandoned, surpressed or concealed the invention.

Japan

1. Anything which, before the filing date (priority date), was publicly known or worked, published, or made available to the public through electric telecommunication lines.
2. Contents of certain Japanese patent and utility model applications with an earlier filing date (priority date).

India

Publication in any document or used in India or elsewhere in the world before the filing date (priority date).

Are patent text and images Copyrighted?

There is a debate over this topic that text and images of patent are subject of copyright protection. I have researched over this and found out that the answer to this debate is no.

Copyright: Copyright is a form of protection provided to the authors of "original works of authorship" including literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, and certain other intellectual works, both published and unpublished. The 1976 Copyright Act generally gives the owner of copyright the exclusive right to reproduce the copyrighted work, to prepare derivative works, to distribute copies or phonorecords of the copyrighted work, to perform the copyrighted work publicly, or to display the copyrighted work publicly. 

Patent: A patent for an invention is the grant of a property right to the inventor, issued by the Patent and Trademark Office. The term of a new patent is 20 years from the date on which the application for the patent was filed in the United States or, in special cases, from the date an earlier related application was filed, subject to the payment of maintenance fees. 

The text of patent is made by research and references the inventor has cited with little or no modification from the prior art, hence their text and images can not be copyrighted. There is disclosure part in patent body which is subjected to copyright.