How To Deal With Patent Infringement

Article Written By: WolfingerStain

Patents enable an inventor to check unauthorized use of his or her invention by other parties for their own personal gains in an illegal and unauthorized manner. They allow the inventor to prosecute a person or firm for trying to make such illegal use of the original invention or its process. However, there are a few aspects that need to be kept in mind before taking legal action against an infringement.

Firstly, you must ensure that there has been a complete and perceptible infringement of your product protected by patent. In other words, the infringing product must have copied all features of your original product. Although in certain exceptional cases where some of the features of the invention have not been imitated, it can still be treated as an infringement. However, you will have to prove that the major aspects of the infringing product are same as the patented product in all respects and produce the same outcome as the patented product.

Secondly, you cannot be a third party and file a suit against the infringer, which implies that you must have some direct connection with the patent. You can either be the owner of the patent or a licensee - exclusive or partial - of the product in order to be eligible for filing a suit for violation. You would also be required to file a lawsuit within the time period allotted by the limitation law of the state, after which any claim would become invalid.

Although you can proceed against not only the manufacturer of the infringing product but also against the person who uses the product, any such action can be taken only while the patent lasts. No unauthorized usage of the product can be considered a deliberate infringement after the lapse of the patent.

Finally, you must also remember that patents can play a role in scientific research without it being labelled as an act of infringement even though the law of patent is based on the principle of strict liability.

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This Article Has Been Published on Thu, 1 Jul 2010 and Read 134 Times

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