The Patent Declaration

Understand Your Responsibilities in Filing

The Patent Declaration or Oath. In following the steps for getting a patent under US patent law one of the required steps in the process to get a patent is the submission of an oath or declaration.

What are the requirements of a declaration under US patent law?

Without getting into too much legalese - the law states that the inventor must sign a document that:

    Identifies each inventor by full name;

    Identifies the country of citizenship of each inventor;

    States that the person making the oath or declaration believes the inventor(s) to be the original inventor(s) of this invention.

In addition the document should

    Identify the application being talked about;

    State that the person making the oath or declaration has reviewed and understands the contents of the application;

    State that the person making the oath or declaration acknowledges the duty to disclose to the Office all information known to the person to be material to patentability.


How to do this

All of this sounds complex and legalistic and in fact it needs to be done correctly as one of the steps for getting a patent. But it does not require you to hire an expensive contract lawyer to write it. In fact the US patent office provides a boilerplate form to ensure it is done correctly. The form [PTO/SB/01] can be found on the patent office web site in their long list of forms.

Each of the requirements listed above are included in this form. It makes it possible for your patent practitioner to complete the Declaration requirements accurately and hopefully at a low cost.



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Mike Ervin
Mike Ervin - Cost Effective Small Business Patent Protection.

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