Article

Expired Patents: Wealth of knowledge

By Bindu Sharma, Patent Attorney, Origiin IP Solutions LL

A patent is a set of exclusive rights granted by a state (national government) to inventors or their assignee for a limited period of time in exchange for public disclosure of an invention. The word “patent” has been derived from a Latin word patere, which means “to lay open” (i.e., to make available for public inspection).

As patent gives exclusive rights to the inventor to prevent third parties from making, using, selling, offering for sale and importing the patented product in the jurisdictions where there is a patent protection. This means that as long as patent is in force, a patent shall not be used by any third parties without seeking permission of the patent holder. However, the term of a patent is usually 20 years from the date of filing and after which the patent expires and is no more in force.

Technically speaking, the patent, which has run its full term in a country and is no longer protected there, is called as an Expired Patent. Once the patent has expired, it cannot be renewed or restored.On cessation of the patent rights, which may happen due to non-payment of renewal fee or on expiry of the term of patent, the subject matter covered by the said patent shall not be entitled to any protection. It is supposed to be in public domain as prior art and patent fails to be in force.

It’s worth noting here that a patent might expire before completing the term of 20 years. If the patentee has missed renewal fee payment and fails to restore such lapsed patent within the prescribed time, it expires even though the term of 20 years is not complete. It is extremely important to accurately calculate the term of a patent and ensure legal status to confirm if it is an expired patent in a specific jurisdiction.

In India, the term of a patent is generally 20 years from the date of filing patent application, provided payment of renewal fee is done in time.However, the term of patent, in case of International applications filed under the Patent Cooperation Treaty designating India, shall be twenty years from the international filing date accorded under the PCT. The patent of addition expires on the same day as the main application irrespective of the date on which patent of addition was filed. Though main patent and patent of addition have same term, under certain circumstances, the patent of addition can be made as an independent patent, which needs to be checked carefully.The term of patent for a divisional application shall be twenty years from the date of filing of main application or international filing date, in case the application was divided out of National phase application under PCT. Thorough due-diligence is mandatory before using such expired patents in a given jurisdiction to minimize patent infringement risk.

Now, in case of pharmaceutical industry, several drugs go off-patent every year and the revenue loss for the patentee is huge. However, these off-patent drugs give liberty to the generic drug manufacturers, especially in the developing countries to manufacture and offer drugs at affordable price and over-the-counter accessibility. The World Generic Medicines Congress Europe 2015 indicates that drugs valued at $170 billion in annual sales go off patent in the year 2015.For example, Aripiprazole by Otsuka Pharmaceuticals, glatirame by TevaPharma, albuterol-ipratropium inhalation by BoehringerIngelheim, imatinibmesylate by Novartis, memantine HCI by Forrest Labs, etc. are some of the drugs for which the patents are going to be expired.

Primarily, due to importance of public health, even though pharmaceutical industry is the most talked about industry when it comes to usage of expired patents or manufacture of generic drugs, expired patents serve as a valuable source of knowledge for any industry. However, one needs to seek legal assistance and perform thorough due diligence before using such expired patents.

Innovative product

CarIQ- Making cars smarter

This month we are presenting CarIQ, India’s first connected car ecosystem as innovative product of the month. Founded in August 2012, CarIQ is a fast growing young company with a pretty ambitious dream. CarIQ’s device, “The SmartPlug” is based on the OBD II port and is intended to make cars smarter and at the same time simplify the process of maintaining a car. The device constantly reads information from your car’s ECU. The data collected is then sent to the cloud where the information is compiled and crunched to make sense and finally provided to the user via a mobile application. The device acts as a portable diagnostic kit for your vehicle, keeping you updated on vital stats such as your car’s health and battery health. The device helps keep a check on the engine’s health and other such vital information. The device also acts as a GPS tracker keeping a track on the vehicle and its whereabouts with information like the speed and the duration of each trip, thereby providing remote access to the vehicles locations and the driving patterns of the driver in the vehicle.

CarIQ’s platform gives the user ability to set geo fences for their vehicles, providing them with alerts as and when the vehicle crosses the pre-set boundary. Over speeding alerts can be set to get notifications on the car crossing the set speed limit. Crash alerts are also provided, notifying a set of pre stored numbers configured as per the user’s choice. Routes and trips can be mapped and shared on the users desired social media platform. It also allows integration of a gaming option where the users can get ranked and earn badges as per their driving and the achievements they unlock in due course.

The SmartPlug studies driving patterns of the driver and then helps the user by providing personalised tips to increase the efficiency of the vehicle and at the same time reduces wear and tear.

The device acts as a portable diagnostic kit for your vehicle, bridging the gap between the user and his/ her car, enabling the user to understand the problems being faced by the vehicle and suggests corrective measures to be taken to ensure longevity in the cars life. It keeps your car with you in your pocket at all times enabling to keep a close eye on your vehicle and also serves as database to see where, when and how the car has been driven. So, start listening to your car by simply using this innovative product.

For more information, please visit:http://mycariq.com/

Interesting patent

Title of the invention: Therapeutic horse shoe

Publication number:      US4605071 A

Publication type:           Grant

Application number:       US 06/679,202

Publication date:           12 Aug 1986

Filing date:                    6 Dec 1984

Inventors:                     David P. McKibben

ABSTRACT: 

The invention is a therapeutic horseshoe (10) including an impact frame (12) for supporting a horse’s foot and a cushioned insert (14) for nesting into an insert depression (16) formed in the upper surface (40 ) of the impact frame such that the insert (14) provides force absorption and kinetic energy return to a ring like portion of the sole of the foot. The lower surface (50) of the impact frame includes a front slope (62) and a rear slope (64) which improves shock impact and step characteristics in the foot and are important in specifically preventing and alleviating symptoms of laminitis and navicular disease in horses. An alternate toe-in, toe-out shoe (80) is adapted for correction of unbalanced hoof conditions. The therapeutic horseshoe (10) and the toe-in, toe-out shoe (80) are ideal for use by horse professionals such as farriers, veterinarians and trainers. The shoes are also usable on healthy horses as a preventive measure against causes of lameness and as a racing speed enhancement.

Interview

Exclusive Interview with Mandar Satpute, CEO , 24x7 learning

In this issue, we are extremely happy to publish interview of Mr. Mandar Satpute, CEO at 24X7 Learning, a company involved in delivering comprehensive learning experience across the globe. Mr.Satpute, an alumnus of IIM- C has been instrumental in development in some of the core areas like Banking Operations, Risk management, Business Process management etc. Mr.Satpute has been involved in spearheading a cross section of business in India for some of the renowned organizations like Tata Consultancy Service, Citibank, Asian paints etc.

Origiin: It is a great pleasure for us to interact with you and publish your thoughts in this interview.

Mandar Satpute: Thank you for this opportunity to share my perspective and thoughts on learning and development.

Origiin:You have nearly 17 years of rich experience across banking, IT and FMCG industries. Your latest association happens to be in the area of learning, reaching across the world by creating suitable courses for talent enhancement needs.How do you feel to be involved in such diversified areas?

MandarSatpute: Firstly, it’san honor and a privilege to be part of the talent enhancement industry. Secondly, in previous organizations that I worked for being a part of such diverse roles was challenging and exciting.I was involved in different roles and departments, across banking, IT, ITES, and FMCG. Now, at 24×7 Learning I am involved with helping of learning and developing organizations of various verticals to help their talent enhancement efforts of their employees.

Being closely associated with these industries has given me a deep understanding of the importance of learning and development within organizations – no matter which industry or vertical. The perspective gained from my wide experience provides me with a great platform to contribute to talent enhancement in organizations.

Origiin:The Company of yours, 24X7 Learning offers a vast learning platform for organizations including Manufacturing, Retail, Pharma to IT. How does innovation plays role in devising learning platform for strategic visions of the different clients?

MandarSatpute: 24×7 Learning is an online learning solutions company that provides learning solutions for large, mid-sized and small businesses of all industries across the globe. But we have to keep in mind that every industry is different. Every organization has a different vision. Every organization faces different challenges. The training challenges faced by one industry are not the same as the training challenges faced by another. Take the Finance industry for example, the biggest challenge faced by this industry is making sure that its employees are up-to-date with the various schemes and policies keep changing ever so often. The biggest challenge for Oil & Natural Gas industry would be compliance with safety regulations. For the Retail industry it could be customer satisfaction. The biggest training challenge faced by the Pharma industry could be training a mobile workforce. Then again, within each industry, each organization may have its own training challenges. While one organization has a lack of training funds, another may suffer from a lack of space to train its employees.

Innovation is the key. At 24×7 Learning, we create innovative solutions with the help of technology. We build our products to be versatile and adaptable. E.g. “LearnTrak” LMS provides ability for an organization to deliver learning on any mobile device, any browser, where there is no or weak internet connectivity, learning that transcends geographical boundaries and languages, just-in-time learning, learning that can take place anytime and anywhere. It has features to provide personalized training, social learning and knowledge collaboration, instant access to knowledge and assessments that are created as per the requirements of the client. Besides these, for managers and administrators we make tracking of the learning of employees easy. We provide analytics and reports to enable decision making. If required we can customize the product to meet a particular organization’s needs.

In our Custom content development we work with the client to understand the objective of a course, the profile of the learner and the purpose the organization for taking up the project. Based on this, the creative team comes up with an approach that will best suit their needs. It’s only then is the course taken up for development.

To say the same things in short, staying connected with the client and its industry is a key input which drives our innovation.  We keep review our position constantly and change or adapt the product to meeting ever changing needs.

Origiin:The product like Learn Track LMS of your company seems to be a breakthrough in e- learning industry. Tell us how the idea was conceived and put into execution.

Mandar Satpute: In the last few years we have seen a transformation in the Learning field. Computer and mobile ownership with internet accessibility is growing exponentially, access to newer technologies is providing us a platform to transcend traditional barriers, and so workforce is increasingly dispersed geographically. Today, training is made simple, precise and very muchsuccessful with eLearning. There is a need for a robust and dynamic scalable training solution that can scale up to the ever increasing demands of organizations.We are in the midst of a global shift. Embracing the new paradigm of eLearning is going to take us to the future faster. These were some of the drivers which we at 24×7 Learning looked at and were inspired to create an anytime, anywhere learning solution, which is  easy to use and easy to deploy – LearnTrak LMS.

Once the idea was conceived the organization focused relentlessly on the execution. The development team faced many challenges on the way.  Thanks to the efforts put out by them and the guidance received from seniors for whom you are seeing the product in its present shape and form.

Origiin: By looking at the present trend, enrolment for online study has grown by over 40 to 50 percent in recent years, whereby people choose to upgrade qualifications or commence a carrier by online learning. What is your say on this?

Mandar Satpute: This is just the beginning and we will see exponential growth in the coming years. The online learning industry is set to go through a big boom.

Firstly, today’s workforce is a mobile workforce. Nobody is sitting at a desk anymore; employees are on the go and don’t have the time to undergo traditional training. Organizations find it impossible to conduct classroom training sessions because their employees are out. The solution to this is online learning.

Secondly, due to the competitive pressure on organizations productivity cannot suffer during training – the solution is again online learning.

Thirdly, for immediate answers and for knowledge at your fingertips – which is important for industries like Insurance, Pharma and Health – the solution is again online learning.

There are those who want to upgrade their skills or educational qualifications without letting go of their present job – its online learning once again.

Additionally with higher incomes people want to pursue different interests or even get proficient say in a hobby – with limited time availability the solution to all of these is on line learning. L&D departments need an easy solution to all their training woes – An LMS which supports them in meeting the challenges faced by them is required.

Origiin: What are your vision and growth strategies for 24 X 7 Learning in the coming years?

Mandar Satpute: Until today we have provided a successful learning solution to our clients. We have not just kept up with training challenges and training needs, we have also kept ourselves one step ahead of the game by preempting and perceiving what organizations will soon need. Learn Trak LMS is an extremely successful product and our aim for the future is to build on that success.

We are expanding globally as well and want to establish ourselves as ‘the company’ for meeting requirements of a corporate learner. My vision is to keep 24×7 Learning at the cutting edge of online learning innovation to best serve our customers.

Origiin: Thank you so much Sir for your valuable inputs.

Innovative product

LearnTrak LMS – A Comprehensive Learning Management System

Learn Trak Learning Management System (LMS), a product from 24×7 learning, is a breakthrough in learning industry, which gives a platform for employees in any organisations by giving access to training for 24×7, so that they can learn at their own convenience.

Today’s organizations lack skilled workers & workforce training challenges hinder employee learning, employee engagement, and up skilling of employees. These challenges include geographically dispersed workforces, inconsistent training across locations and the inability to determine how successful in-house organizational training really is. When a workforce is dispersed across locations and countries, training is haphazard, inconsistent and very expensive. Time and budget constraints lead to shoddy training which in turn leads to disinterest. There is no sure method to know what employees really need to increase their productivity, and this leads to poor productivity and decreased efficiency.

To counter this drawback, 24×7 learning, a leading online learning solutions company headquartered in India,introduces LearnTrak LMS, which is an online learning platform that has been designed to provide a one-stop solution for all learning needs – for both administrators as well as employees. Employees such as sales reps and banking staff, who are deployed in remote locations, can make use of the offline course player to access training even when there is no internet connectivity.With its HTML5 user interface, learners can access training on any mobile device – be it a smartphone, tablet, netbook or laptop – giving learners the freedom to choose the device they learn on, and the browser. Its online library provides learners with unlimited access to a large online database of organization-specific knowledge, be it for Pharmaceutical, Finance, Automobile or any other industry. LearnTrak LMS also supports multiple languages, giving learners the freedom to learn in the language of their choice. This works well for organizations that have employees who belong to diverse cultures. The Virtual classroom feature allows trainers to conduct training sessions virtually, thereby enabling them to reach out to employees wherever they are.It can be used totrain new hires and even upskill the existing employeesand through its surveys, feedbacks and polls features, the administrators can get an accurate idea of what their employees want. So, this particular product, LearnTrak LMS, which is easy to install and deploy and which allows employees to take full control of their career is surely an innovative product for better future.

Interesting Patent

Title of the invention: Aquarium watch

Publication number:       US 6416217 B1

Publication type:           Grant

Application number:       US 09/761,366

Publication date:           9 Jul 2002

Filing date:                   16 Jan 2001

Inventors:                    Harold von Braunhut

ABSTRACT: A timepiece has a removable attachable aquarium adapted to support aquatic life. Living aquatic pets are introduced into the aquarium prior to attaching the aquarium to the timepiece. A wearer of such timepiece is then able to contemporaneously tell time and enjoy watching the living aquatic pets. A kit is also provided with a timepiece, an aquarium and aquatic life adapted to be supported in said aquarium.

Column

Use patents to reduce R&D efforts

By Bindu Sharma, Patent Attorney, Origiin IP Solutions LLP

Patent is techno-legal document submitted by the inventor to respective patent offices, in order to claim legal rights over the invention, in order to prevent third parties from using it without the consent of the inventor. Disclosing the best mode of working of the invention is one of the important requirements to get a patent, which means that an invention submitted to the patent office in the form of a patent must disclose the invention to the extent that a person with ordinary skill in the art understands it well. Additionally, the description of the invention, supported with drawings and examples further helps in understanding the working of the invention. Since the grant of a patent undergoes various steps, including the examination of the patent application by expert examiners, the subject matter claimed in a patent must not only be novel and inventive but also must meet the statutory standards.

However, it is important to note that in addition to the disclosure of invention, the inventor claims the invention to acquire legal rights over it. Violation of such legal rights may have serious implications. Hence, though the invention is disclosed to the public, it is not available for free.

As we know that patents are wealth of knowledge for various reasons. Let’s further understand how this wealth can be effectively and hygienically used to reduce R&D efforts.Suppose you are doing research on the product that is meant for water purification that converts any kind of water into potable and drinking water. Before starting the process of R&D and designing your product, you have two options. The first option is to have discussion with your team of engineers and design the product. With this, you can finalise the product, which might be replication of something that has already been claimed or you might land up infringing the existing patents. Further investing time in R&D may also lead to similar situation. Hence, the output may not be as fruitful as it could be.

However, the second option is to outline the features that you want to have in the product and list all the patents that relate to such features. Go through such patents thoroughly and shortlist the ones that seem to be relevant. By doing this, you will get to know about:

1. The technologies already patented by others so that you don’t waste your time in re-inventing the wheel. This way you can start your research from the next level altogether. State-of-the-art is a gold mine and before inventing further, it makes lots of sense to mine it. However, if there are no patents filed or granted in the given area of technology, you have more reasons to smile and be confident that this space is available for further research.

2. The top companies working in this area and their core expertise. You might get opportunity to collaborate on R&D or further build business relationship with such companies.

3. The patents that you would like to use or even implement on your current products or processes. However, you may have to further do due diligence to ensure that you are not infringing any third party’s rights. If such patents are filed in the jurisdictions or countries where you have or plan to have business, you can always look for in-licensing such patents.

Since this whole exercise gives you enough exposure to the patents filed or granted in the area of technology of your interest, you get better clarity on the steps to be taken for further development of the product, direction in which R& D efforts has to be planned and of course, patentability assessment of your new ideas. This not only saves R&D effort and time but also helps you to come up with more innovative products having more sustainability in the market.

Note: The information provided in the article is generic and is only for general understanding of the subject. For specific matters, please take advice from the expert as certain steps provided are very sensitive and shall be performed only by the experts.