Patent Law

A patent is right symbolized by a document granted to the owner of a creative work to exclude others from making, using or selling the work described in the document. The patent is issued by the federal government by application. The patent has an expiration period of 20 years. Following expiration, the invention becomes public domain and everyone is free to exploit it. The purpose of granting patents is to encourage public disclosure of technical advances and provide the creator monopoly over his work.

The rules and regulations promulgated by the U.S. United States Patent and Trademark Office are extensive and complicated. The first important requirement that an inventor should comply with is timeliness. An application for patent must be filed within a year following certain acts, such as the public disclosure of the work or the sale and use of the work. Other countries in the world do not grant this one-year grace period so American inventors who seek to obtain foreign patents must file an application for patent first in the United States before publicly disclosing the work. In the United States, patents are granted to the person who first created the work. To prove this, the inventor must keep complete record of the progress of his work, from the day the idea was hatched. Prior to the application of the patent, the inventor must do extensive research to check whether someone else has already been granted a patent to the same or similar invention. The invention and the method by which it will be used must be thoroughly described in the application. The description is in writing or in drawing.

Not all inventions are granted patents. The proper subject matter of a patent is any product or process, including genetically modified bacteria or plants. There are numerous requirements laid out by federal law, and the non-compliance on one would mean the denial of the entire application. Federal law requires the invention to be new, which means it has not yet been invented by another or used in another county before the actual invention date. The invention must also be useful or has commercial worth. In addition, the invention must also pass the non-obviousness test, which means that a person with ordinary would not have found the invention obvious at the time it was made. These are requirements that must be determined prior to the application of patent. The determination of patentability must be conducted by an expert patent law attorney to save the cost and time of applying for a patent only to be rejected later on because the patentability test is not met.

The primary purpose for the application of patents is to take commercial advantage of the invention in order to recoup the high cost of research and development. Like any other type of property, rights granted in a patent can be sold or rented. An inventor can earn directly by practicing his invention or indirectly by selling the patent. Inventors must take note though that they cannot practice their invention freely if its practice would encroach on the patent of another inventor. This means that if the invention needs another part and that part is not licensed or is licensed to another person, the inventor cannot practice the invention as he might be subjected to an infringement case. The two inventors, however, can agree to work together and freely use each other's invention. By selling patent or granting exclusive licenses to his patent. Patents are very valuable and, if used in the best possible way, will pave for a technologically advanced society.

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Bankruptcy Law - Legal Information and Resources

Bankruptcy

Bankruptcy in the United States is governed by the U.S. Bankruptcy Code.Different types of bankruptcy filings are governed by specificsections of the Bankruptcy Code. The types of bankruptcies are: (i)reorganization under Chapter 11 for corporations and individuals,(ii) liquidation under Chapter 7 for corporations and individuals,(iii) Chapter 13 for individuals, and (iv) Chapter 9 for municipalities. Another type of bankruptcy proceeding in the United States are proceedings under Chapter 15 of the Bankruptcy Code, whichallows foreign companies, with assets located in the United States,to seek an injunction of all proceedings that would take their assets from them.

Bankruptcy can be considered a special proceeding, with the creation of aspecial set of courts and judges handling these cases. Corporations,municipalities and individuals who seek protection under the Code aregiven so-called "fresh start" by reorganizing their businesses and finances and ranking their creditors by order of priority. The goal of the Code is to allow a debtor to emerge from bankruptcy with a better business structure, or, in the case ofindividuals, a plan for a better management of finances. Bankruptcy is not adversarial in nature, although adversary proceedings may arise from issues relating to bankruptcy.

Lenders, who are often big banks and financial institutions, are firstpriority in the rank of creditors in bankruptcy proceedings. There are also numerous "small" creditors who need a strong voiceto represent them in bankruptcy proceedings. These small creditorsusually include workers who lost their jobs as a result of a debtor'sfinancial difficulty or who are on the verge of losing their jobswhen a debtor decides to halt their operations. The recent decline inoil prices resulted to the bankruptcy filings of numerous oil and gas companies, resulting to the retrenchment of hundreds of workers. Workers file claims for unpaid wages and benefits and retirees.Workers also seek compensation for damages arising from death orpersonal injury as a result of exposure to toxic minerals orchemicals used by bankrupt companies in the operation of their business. Moreover, small creditors include retirees, whose benefitsare often cut or terminated within the course of the bankruptcy proceeding as a cost-saving strategy for the ailing debtor. Retirees,old but have contributed significantly to the company, join the ranksof lenders to seek to have their benefits reinstated and continued.If not represented by a bankruptcy specialist, these small creditors may find their voices lost among the big corporate lenders.

Divorce,illness, student loan debt, and unpaid mortgages are some of thecommon reasons why individuals seek bankruptcy protection, either under Chapter 11 or Chapter 13. When the individual's bankruptcy proceeding is caused by divorce, the individual debtor needs expert representation by a bankruptcy attorney who is not just knowledgeableof the bankruptcy law but also of divorce law, child support andchild custody. In instances when an individual seeks bankruptcy proceeding as a result of staggering student loan debt or unpaid mortgage, the debtor's attorney also need to match the skills of attorneys representing the student loan provider or the mortgagee, which are often big companies equipped with a legal team ready to quash a creditor.

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