Conducting Preliminary Art Searches

It is always helpful to conduct some preliminary searches of related art prior to discussing the matter in detail with your patent attorney.  These searches will help focus your thinking, and always save the attorney time, and you money.

What constitutes “prior art” under the applicable patent laws is not always consistent, and depends on several factors.  For purpose of evaluating whether to proceed with a patent application, a prospective applicant should identify any relevant publications, prior use, or public use that relate to the subject of the invention.  This can be done online, or through readily available prior art search firms (although this costs more money).  The attorney can then sort out with you what actually constitutes or qualifies as “prior art.”

In addition to using Google, Yahoo, and other “search engines” to do specific internet searches, you should also learn how to use and make searches of the online patent databases.  Although this takes time, again, it may save you some significant lawyers fees and filing costs if you determine that someone conceived and reduced to practice your invention well before you. Below are a few of the free websites that provide access to patent databases. 

US Patent & Trademark Office (Free)
FreePatentsOnline.com (Free)

The Law Offices of Steven G. Lisa, Ltd. requires that any prospective client, at a minimum, conduct online and patent database searches before contacting us.  Please save all details of your searches, including your “Queries” and your results.  Thank you.