Hey guys I am new to this forum. I have read through and wished I found this community earlier. I see a lot of you guys have knowledge that I hope to gain and share one day. I have thought I've been living in the fastlane because I don't really have money problems and have 6 figures saved up. Looking back at how hard I had to work to save that money and having no knowledge of what to do with it but to use it as a down payment for a home rather than investing it where it will work for me makes me realize I am in the slow lane but I have faith that I have the potential and drive to make it to the fast lane.
My current issue is, I have an idea that I don't see out there. It is simple and doesn't seem costly to make. My initial plan was to get it protected with a utility patent. I would then target 2 reputable companies to partner up with my idea. These companies sell products with similar concepts and I can even make my product compatible with one of theirs. I have faith that this product can be in a few franchise businesses and then mom and pop shops would follow. I was confident or arrogant that I would have an upper hand by the 2 companies (which are competitors) having knowledge that I am approaching each of them with the opportunity to partner up with me. I thought they would feel the idea was great and would hop on to this partnership because they would hate to see their competitor succeed with my idea. Haha. I wanted to partner up with one of these companies because they were a trusted brand and also hoping we can go through their sources so prototyping and manufacturing would be easier.
So I chose a patent attorney, he told me my idea is not patentable because it is too obvious. He said I can maybe patent it if I include the built in adapter to make my product compatible with the company above's product. I paid him the $1200 to do the patent search. He says my product is slightly patentable. I then asked him if I can just go to making a prototype and then manufacturing. Can I get in trouble? He answers with,
"This search was to determine novelty. What you are asking for is a "freedom to operate" opinion which is a much more costly search. I can't make any assessment of whether you can use a certain adapter or not as I have done research in this area on your behalf."
I feel I made no progress. Maybe my patent attorney sucks? I am now left with 2 idea options. Idea A, which is too obvious to patent and idea B, which is the same as idea A except it has a built in adapter to make compatible with an existing product of the company stated above. However idea B seems dangerous. Maybe there is possible patent infringement? I want to just do this on my own and go with the obvious idea A that can't be patented. I have a basic isometric drawing to scale on graph paper. I was thinking about contacting a company on alibaba.com to make the prototype but when I tried signing up to their site, it says I have to have a registered company name? Do I need to start a company to start this process? I don't mean to annoy anyone with noob questions. I just have faith that I can get the ball rolling with this idea and want to execute thoroughly so that I will make the least mistakes possible.
My current issue is, I have an idea that I don't see out there. It is simple and doesn't seem costly to make. My initial plan was to get it protected with a utility patent. I would then target 2 reputable companies to partner up with my idea. These companies sell products with similar concepts and I can even make my product compatible with one of theirs. I have faith that this product can be in a few franchise businesses and then mom and pop shops would follow. I was confident or arrogant that I would have an upper hand by the 2 companies (which are competitors) having knowledge that I am approaching each of them with the opportunity to partner up with me. I thought they would feel the idea was great and would hop on to this partnership because they would hate to see their competitor succeed with my idea. Haha. I wanted to partner up with one of these companies because they were a trusted brand and also hoping we can go through their sources so prototyping and manufacturing would be easier.
So I chose a patent attorney, he told me my idea is not patentable because it is too obvious. He said I can maybe patent it if I include the built in adapter to make my product compatible with the company above's product. I paid him the $1200 to do the patent search. He says my product is slightly patentable. I then asked him if I can just go to making a prototype and then manufacturing. Can I get in trouble? He answers with,
"This search was to determine novelty. What you are asking for is a "freedom to operate" opinion which is a much more costly search. I can't make any assessment of whether you can use a certain adapter or not as I have done research in this area on your behalf."
I feel I made no progress. Maybe my patent attorney sucks? I am now left with 2 idea options. Idea A, which is too obvious to patent and idea B, which is the same as idea A except it has a built in adapter to make compatible with an existing product of the company stated above. However idea B seems dangerous. Maybe there is possible patent infringement? I want to just do this on my own and go with the obvious idea A that can't be patented. I have a basic isometric drawing to scale on graph paper. I was thinking about contacting a company on alibaba.com to make the prototype but when I tried signing up to their site, it says I have to have a registered company name? Do I need to start a company to start this process? I don't mean to annoy anyone with noob questions. I just have faith that I can get the ball rolling with this idea and want to execute thoroughly so that I will make the least mistakes possible.
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