Patents: Meaning, Definition and Types!
Meaning:
Patents are one of the oldest forms of intellectual property protection. The basic aim of a
patent system is to encourage economic and technological development by rewarding
individual creativity and/or intellectual. A patent under the act is a grant from the government
to inventors, for a limited period of time, the exclusive right to make, use, exercise, and vend
the invention.
As per Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), Article 33, the periods of patent is
20 years from the date of filing of the application for a patent. At the end of patent period, the
government publishes the invention and it becomes part of the public domain.
In other words, after the expiry of patent period the public can make use of the patent. As part
of the public domain it is assumed that the disclosure of patent for public will stimulate ideas
and perhaps even the development of an even better product that could replace the original.
Patents as one’s exclusive property rights can be sold, transferred, willed, licensed, or used as
collateral much like other valuable assets. In fact, most independent inventors do not
commercialise their inventions or create new products from their ideas, instead, they sell or
license their patents to others who have the resources to develop.
To quote one such case, the Coca-Cola formula was developed by a compounder. He could
not commercialise it due to lack of required resources. He sold it to a doctor who
commercialised ‘the Coca Cola formula’. Patent history is replete with such examples.
What can be patented?
The Indian Patent Act, 1970 has notified the nature of patentable inventions.
These are classified and summarized in the following paragraphs:
Table 31.1: What Can Be Patented?
Processes Methods of production, research, testing, analysis, and other
technologies with new applications.
Machines Products, instruments, machines, and other physical objects that
have proved useful and unique in nature.
Manufactures Combination of physical matter not found in nature fabricated in
unique and useful application.
Compositions of Chemical compounds, medicines, and botanical compositions that
Matter do not exist in nature in an uncultivated state, nor those that could
evolve in nature, better new and useful.
A brief description of each of these follows in seriatim.
Process:
In the patents law, the word process refers to either new methods of manufacturing or new
technological procedures that can be demonstrated and validated as new and/or unique. For
example, the process of electrical power transmission was new and unique when it was
patented.
Similarly, a new process of testing blood samples was patented. Here, what is worth noting
that, in both the cases, there was not a specific product {i.e., no physical object), but both the
processes were well documented and subsequently demonstrated as being workable, new, and
useful.
Machine:
According to Patent Law, machine means the application of patent for a specific physical
item. Generally, we think of patents for physical products. Here also, machine needs to be
new and useful. That is just an art work or mere curiosity for something cannot be patented.
Manufacture:
The word machine in a patent law refers to specific physical items that have been fabricated
through new combinations of materials or technical applications. The application must
demonstrate and validate how the product is manufactured.
Composition of Matter:
The composition of matter as used in the patent law refers to composition, or say, mixture of
chemical compounds such as synthetic materials, medicines, cosmetics, and biogenetic
catalysts. This means simply having a composition or mixture of ingredient does not
constitute a patentable composition. Thus, what follows is that the compositions or mixtures
of known ingredients are not patentable. To be patentable, the composition must have a new
ingredient.
Types of Patents:
The Patent Law classifies all the patents into three types:
1. Utility Patents.
2. Design Patents.
3. Plant Patents.
These are discussed one by one:
1. Utility Patents:
Patents granted for new products, processes, machines, methods of manufacturing, and
composition of matter come under the category of utility patents. This is the most common
patents sought by the inventors. It is granted for 17 years. The utility patents exclude most of
botanical creations related to plant and agricultural use.
2. Design Patents:
Design Patents are granted for any new or original ornamental design for an article of
manufacture. Examples are shoe companies such as Reebok and Nike that have become more
interested in design patents as a means of protecting their ornamental designs. What is the
most important element in the design patent is that it protects the appearance (say, design) of
the article, not the article itself.
For example, dozens of bicycle manufacturers manufacture their bicycles for exercise and
fitness. These bicycles use similar principles of dynamic tension. Nonetheless, the bicycle
manufacturers design their bicycles so that these appear different and unique.
By obtaining design patents, they differentiate their bicycles and cycle market reaches from
cloning manufacturers that might replicate bicycles. Here, it is important to mention that
merely having the idea of cycling for exercise and fitness is not patentable. Compared to
utility patent design patent has a shorter life for 3.5 or 7 years.
3. Plant Patent:
Plant Patent is granted for any new variety of plant that has been asexually reproduced by an
inventor. The new plants may be patented only when the inventor satisfies the patent office
that the new plant did not exist in nature or in an uncultivated state. Like utility patent, a plant
patent provides the protection for 17 years.
What kind of protection does a patent offer? ↓
In principle, the patent owner has the exclusive right to prevent or stop others from
commercially exploiting the patented invention. In other words, patent protection means that
the invention cannot be commercially made, used, distributed, imported or sold by others
without the patent owner's consent.
Is a patent valid in every country? ↓
Patents are territorial rights. In general, the exclusive rights are only applicable in the country
or region in which a patent has been filed and granted, in accordance with the law of that
country or region.
