A patent is a legal right given to the patentee by the State to exclude all others from making, using or selling the invention for a certain period of time, usually 20 years. Subsequently, the inventor must disclose the invention so that it is free for all others to use when the patent expires.

Securing a monopoly for a technical invention and also to create a valuable Intangible Asset. Today,a large portion of assets of major companies across the world are in Intangible form.Nearly 90% of the value of the Big Five Tech companies(Amazon,Apple,Microsoft, Facebook and Alphabet(Google) comes from their Intangible Assets.

It is a feature of an invention that involves a technical advancement as compared to the existing knowledge or having economic significance or both, and that makes the invention not obvious to a person skilled in the art.

An invention is new if it does not form part of the state of the art. The state of the art comprises everything made available to the public, anywhere in the world, by means of a written or oral description, by use, or in any other way, before the date of filing of the patent application.

Prior art is evidence proving that the invention was known earlier. Prior art may include published disclosures, public demonstrations / use, disclosed to the public by other means, and oral descriptions.

The prior art constitution varies among various jurisdictions. For example, the US patent law accepts “your disclosure” if it has been made within a year prior to the patent filing date. Other countries including India and Europe have a first to file concept where your own disclosure can constitute prior art for your patent application.

A patent search helps to know if your invention already exists or is similar to any other known invention. You can explore patent databases and other available resources to identify prior art.

For a valid patent, an invention must be

1. novel
2. involve an inventive step
3. be capable of industrial application.

It simply means your patent application may get rejected on the ground of not being unique or being similar to an existing invention.

A provisional application is a legal document filed before the Patent Office that establishes an early filing date, but does not mature into an issued patent unless the applicant files a regular non-provisional or complete patent application within one year.

The provisional patent application gets abandoned and you cannot claim priority to your provisional patent application.

A complete Specification is a regular patent application that the patent office prosecutes, examines and grants. A complete specification consists of the full disclosure of the invention along with claims that define the legal limits of the invention.

Field of invention.

Background of the invention.

Brief summary of the invention.

Brief description of the drawings.

Detailed description of the invention.

Claims.

Abstract

Drawings, if any.

The term “patent pending” refers to a patent application that is pending before the patent office. Patent pending means that the application has been filed with the patent office, the application is pending with the patent office, but no patent has been granted or issued.