Patents

The United States Patent and Trademark Office says that a patent for an invention is the grant of a property right to the inventor, issued by
the United States Patent and Trademark Office.

What is a Patent?

A patent for an invention is the grant of a property right to the inventor, issued by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). The right conferred by the patent grant is, in the language of the statute, “the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, or selling” the invention in the United States or “importing” the invention into the United States. What is granted is not the right to make, use, offer for sale, sell or import, but the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, selling or importing the invention. Once a patent is issued, the patentee must enforce the patent without aid of the USPTO. U.S. patent grants are effective only within the United States, U.S. territories, and U.S. possessions. Foreign patents must be obtained in order to enforce rights in other countries.

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Patent Resources

• United States Patent and Trademark website
• United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Court
• Patent Application Information Retrieval website. Here you can find the status of published patent applications and issued patents, as well as view and print file histories and check continuity data for related cases.
• Website to download PDF-formatted patents
• Claiming the Benefit of a Prior-Filed Application under 35 U.S.C. §§ 119(e), 120, 121, and 365(c)
• Espace – European Patent Office. This website offers worldwide patent searching.
• Japanese Patent Office
• Website to check if maintenance fees have been paid for a U.S. patent
• Website to check assignment information regarding patents and published applications
• European Patent Office patent file histories
• U.S. patent file histories (for a fee, if not available on USPTO’s Public PAIR site)
• Patent Official Gazette (most recent 52 weeks) of patents issued that week, expired or reinstated patents, reissue applications, reexaminations, service by publication, certificates of correction and summaries of final decisions by the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board.