Ron Reardon

In last month’s President’s Message I shared with you yet another of the benefits of being a member of NAPP® – access to professional liability insurance.  This month’s highlight is access to the natural language patent search engine from Patent Café.  The NAPP has arranged to bring you PatentCafe’s advanced Semetric^TM search technology and ICO Global Patent Search at a significantly reduced subscription rate.

As practitioners we have several options available to us for searching prior art.  There are search firms (some of whom have been long time NAPP members), free data bases, paid data bases, etc. from which we can select to determine patentability and the breadth of potentially allowable claims.  Most would agree that conducting a comprehensive search is a combination of art, science and experience.

According to Patent Café, their ICO Global Patent Search, which uses Latent Semantic Analysis technology (contextual natural language), is now the preferred advanced technology search engine used by the leading Fortune 100 patent filers, featuring:

• Search with the highest confidence – even in technologies you are not familiar with,

• Save on every search – according to Patent Café, corporate users are reporting 40% labor savings per search report,

• Fast analysis – the most relevant patents are at the top of the search results list,

• Exclusive graphing, annotation and billable time recording features,

• Full access to all search features, limited to 1,000 patent views or downloads per year.

You must be a member in good standing of the NAPP in order to take advantage of this member benefit.  Activation of your Patent Café account requires that Patent Café first validate your NAPP membership.  You will receive an e-mail notification from Patent Café immediately upon account activation.  Member subscription is for a period of one year from the date the account is activated.

NAPP-discounted ICO Patent Search membership is only for individual users who are members in good standing of the NAPP. 

No multi-user networks are available under the NAPP member benefits discounted program.  If you need a multi-user network for your company or firm, or have product questions, please contact PatentCafe at

http://www.patentcafe.com/index.asp?navid=6&subnavid=27.

Normal subscription price for this service is $5,500 + 20% software maintenance & support per year.  The special pricing available for NAPP members is as follow:

• Annual patent search subscription at an all inclusive discount rate of $2,900 plus 20% software maintenance & support (total $3,480) per year.

• Annual patent search subscription paid in 12 monthly payments of $325.00.

Your credit card will be charged $325/month for 12 months. Your credit card will be processed through Patent Cafe's secure e-commerce.

The credit card charge for your membership will show Patent Café as the payee.  The NAPP does not collect fees associated with your ICO Global Patent Search subscription.

Our arrangement with Patent Café makes their powerful patent search tool more affordable to NAPP members.

If you have questions about this benefit, please contact the NAPP staff at http://www.napp.org/contact.asp.

Demise of USPTO Disclosure Document Program

The USPTO has announced the elimination of its Disclosure Document Program effective February 1, 2007.  For further information click here.

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Tips from the Federal Circuit

In an effort to assist counsel in filing briefs and motions that comply with the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure, the Federal Circuit's Clerk's Office has prepared lists of the "Top Ten Reasons" why such documents are rejected. 

To view the top 10 reasons why formal briefs are rejected click here.

To view the top 10 reasons why formal motions are rejected click here.

Last month Jim Young of Flextrac Systems, Inc. presented a NAPP® Teleconference on docketing systems for intellectual property cases.

Future teleconferences, including registration information, will be announced here and on the NAPP Web site (www.napp.org).

The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and may not necessarily be supported by the NAPP, its members, officers, or directors.

There are no articles in the present issue.

The Disclosure® welcomes the submission of articles on topics related to US and foreign patent practice.  To submit  an article to The Disclosure®, please send it as an e-mail attachment to editor@napp.org.
 

The Disclosure® is a trademark of the National Association of Patent Practitioners.

The Disclosure® is published monthly and is made available to NAPP members and the general public.

Editor:  David Robeson

©2006 National Association of Patent Practitioners.  All rights reserved.

NAPP Officers:

President - G. Ron Reardon

Vice President - Sean Brennan

Treasurer - Jerry Miller

Secretary - Michelle Stempien

NAPP Directors:

Sharon Adams

Kevin Grierson

David Grossman

Tom Hamill

Louis Hoffman

The 2007 NAPP® Annual Meeting will be held in Las Vegas, NV, July 14-17, 2007.  Further details and registration information will be provided here.

The next meeting of the Georgia chapter is scheduled for Wednesday, January 17^th, 2007 from 6:30 to 8:00 p.m. at 11625 Rainwater Drive, Building 500, Suite 350, Alpharetta, GA.  The speaker for the meeting is NAPP President Ron Reardon on the subject of “Strategies for Growing Your Client Base.”

The New Jersey Regional Chapter needs volunteers to help organize NAPP regional meetings in the New Jersey area.  If you are interested in volunteering, please contact us.