George Kobler, an attorney in Huntsville, Alabama whose practices in the area of intellectual property, is the guest on episode 16 of the Ignite Alabama podcast.
IP law encompasses patents, which is the focus of today’s conversation, as well as copyright law, trademarks, and proprietary information that falls within the realm of trade secrets.
In this conversation George explains the difference between copyrights, trademarks, patents and other forms of intellectual property. Our focus is on patent law.
Since the focus is on law and George and I are both members of the Alabama State Bar I wanted to give you the standard disclaimer that lawyers are required to use in advertising and other marketing materials, just to make sure that George and I are both in compliance with rules of the Alabama State Bar.
No representation is made that the quality of legal services to be performed is greater than the quality of legal services performed by other lawyers.
This podcast is intended to provide general information only and shall not create or constitute an attorney-client relationship between the speaker and any listener.
To determine whether something might be eligible for patent protection, the first question is whether it pertains to eligible subject matter.
If the invention, discovery or process is within the scope of eligible subject matter, the next question is whether the invention or discovery is both novel and non-obvious.
I pose several hypothetical examples for George to use in his overview, including one from the realm of digital technology and one involving the mechanical adaptation of a lawn mower.
We also cover situations involving co-inventors, modifications to someone else’s design, inventions and discoveries made in the course of employment or using employer’s resources outside of the scope of employment.
We finish up the question with hypotheticals relating to the team and project-based environment common today, where independent contractors come together to work on one business idea, while remaining free to pursue outside ventures.
Connect with George Kobler
He’s also on Twitter: @RocketCityIP
A special thank you to Rich Ortiz for letting me use the photo of George taken at Investor Day Huntsville.
