Tag: Patent attorney

Quantum Computing – $1 Billion in Patent Applications

~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

If you search Espacenet using the key words “Quantum Computing” it returns 155,000 results!!  Clearly, I have not read them all this afternoon. At a very low legal fee of ~ $6,500 per patent that is ~one billion dollars’ worth of fees for the patent attorney community.

Alice, Bob and the Cat have served them well. They have made a quantum leap in income. Would you like some dinner?

–

–

Reason suggests that it is not possible to come up with 155,000 totally original ideas and concepts beyond the state of the art. There must be redundancy and perhaps overly zealous patent agents have awarded their national home grown talent with a facile grant. Some of these applications cannot be worth the paper they are written upon.

Never mind the quality measure the tonnage. No wonder there is a forestry problem…

I have long speculated that the whole intellectual property (IP) / patent arena is due for a big clean out / dose of salts. It is overblown and over stuffed. The inventive steps are often really trivial,  and not “quantum leaps” in understanding.

To generate new IP against the petabyte background already filed might be tricky. When I last looked, I thought many so called unique ideas were very derivative and the inventive step even obvious to me as a non-expert pikey in his shed.

Sooner or later there is going to be some big blow out tests in court. Or you can have a Samsung – Apple  –   “we’ll sell you ours if you sell us yours” swapsies.

Were I an investor looking at that very basic survey of landscape I would not be champing at the bit (excuse the pun).

“Job” Interview  – IP – Patents Dream 30-07-2025

~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

Here is this morning’s dream had between 5 and 7 AM. I did not think I would go back to sleep but had this from which I awoke exhausted and grilled.

The dream starts in South West London, with a feel of Richmond Wimbledon etc.. I am with a younger man, mid-late thirties. He has bright blonde hair and is tall and slim. He is immaculately dressed in an English suit, overcoat and with expensive English shoes. He is smooth and accustomed to handling people. He is privately school educated and has a crisp posh accent. He has not seen much sun and is a pale indoors person from a high social class family, hence a part of the firm. He is skilled in meet and greet {think main character Pine in The Night Manager only better}. We are in his shared house and getting ready to go into town. There are two other men and one Serbian or Bosnian woman who live there. The hallway to the house has very small black and white tiles and the door is of a large ornate stained glass kind. The implication is that they all work together. They are all high functioning.

The woman is in the kitchen and opens the door out. Bibi our adopted stray cat runs out into the garden. We need to get the cat in because they are all returning to work. In the garden there is a golf style sand bunker. Bibi is in it and wants to play. I go over and sweep her up onto my shoulder as is customary and bring her back into the kitchen. The house is period with original features. It has an Aga over which is a wooden slats clothes dryer, raised by a pulley and cord. The kitchen is massive and decked out for cooking and entertaining. I let Bibi off my shoulder onto the kitchen table and say that I will be back later to drive her home. The woman speaks with an accent to the cat. She is also tall and lithe, gymnastic even. To an extent they are all humouring me as they have been told to do.

I go outside with the young man through a tiled entrance area from what once was the scullery up to street level. I comment that it is nice that all the original enamelled tiles remain. We are running a little behind schedule and we make our way to the ticket office of the over ground railway. The man in the ticket office hands me a small bundle of documents hand sized ~4 by 6 inches. In this is a cardboard “wallet” of yellowed colour and age. In it are old photos of the male side of my family some of whom are in their military uniform. He has gotten them out of records and I must give them to the blond man. The documents contain old out of circulation Sterling banknotes. I hand them to my “guide”.

He takes them and gets two old school train tickets for us. The man form the ticket office says that the next train is at 4:30.  We look at the clock it is nearly an hour to wait. He says that “they” are waiting for us upstairs.

We go up into a busy bar come waiting area. It is lively, there is a hubbub and people are drinking. At one end of the room there is a long rectangular table around which are sat a number of people, less than ten. They are all male ranging in age from mid-thirties to my age. Most of them are wearing suits. They are going to interview me for a “job”. The notion it is for a glass company like Pilkington. The whole things seems weird to me because I have made no job application. They are sort of “head hunting”. The “guide” ushers me to the head of the table and sits me down. The man in charge at the other end of the table welcomes me and says that they are going to ask me a few questions. There is a lot of interplay between panel members. I have a knowing that at least two people on the panel are from the security services, they are British. There is a possible third who says nothing but who had a distinctly American air. He is the only black person on the panel amidst the nondescript white men. He is focussed and attentive.

The chair asks me about patents. I say that I have three granted patents, two on Extreme Ultraviolet (EUV). He asks me how these were filed. I say that when were knocking the ideas of a company about I started the ball rolling by going to Kilburn and Strode to draw up the first patent application. I look to one of the men to my left. The penny drops I have met him before very briefly at Kilburn and Strode. He is a government patent attorney. I claim him and he says that yes, he was there, I too looked vaguely familiar. They want to know who I worked with at Kilburn and Strode. I can’t remember the name except that it was Welsh sounding and that he has gone on to be a senior partner. I suggest that they look him up on the internet. They take over the entertainment screen in the bar and give me some new fangled clicker to run the search. I do not know how to use it. This bemuses them. I say that I have never seen a device like this before. They are disappointed in me. The chair says why would I have used one of these things before.

One of the junior members of the panel asks me about my exam results. Somehow, he has a file about me open on his desk. It has my photo and multiple sheets of paper therein; it is about half a centimetre thick. He has withdrawn the file from records for this purpose. I say that I got four “A”s and four “B”s at “O” level and BCC at “A” level. He tuts unimpressed. I explain to him that this was before rampant grade inflation. He inquires what about the recent “E” grade. I say that I have no idea what he is talking about. I joke that it was my self-taught grade for computer science. One of the panel gestures for him to desist. He backs off.

One of the security people wants again to know whom I worked with at Kilburn & Strode. The name still escapes me. For some reason it is very important for the security guy. I say to him that I have a relatively recent patent grant for a patent entitled “Electric Field Induced Spontaneous Parametric Down Conversion” * . He really wants to know who I worked with all those years ago.

At the far end of the table there is a discussion, which I am not privy to, going on. It is very animated. I remain pretty unsure as to why I am there and what they could possibly want from me. I am incongruous in their company and the plush opulent bar like setting. I can feel that somehow it is important to them but I have no notion of why. It is tiring all that stress.

As I come to, I remember that it was Gwilym Roberts, all those years ago.

The dream ends

—————————————————————————————————————————-

* The full patent title is “Increasing the probability of generating entangled photon pairs using Electric Field Induced Spontaneous Parametric Down Conversion”.

From The Kilburn an Strode Web Site

Arguably the highest profile patent attorney in Europe, Gwilym Roberts advises clients on all aspects of the patent process including IP audit and capture, IP filing strategies and patent portfolio management techniques. He acts for a range of clients including individuals, SMEs, Universities, and spin outs through to multi-nationals and handles a broad and diverse range of cases before the UK Patent Office, EPO and WIPO.

Edinburgh Patents Bioluminescence Dream 02-07-23

~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

Here is this morning’s dream.

The dream is set in Edinburgh. I am with a smartly dressed young woman who has a briefcase. We are in a large old-school department store on a floor devoted to weddings. We are organising a wedding, somehow the young woman is involved in the wedding. It is not clear whose wedding we are organising. I am talking to the be-suited floor manager and his female assistant. They both have Scottish accents. There is some banter as we go over seating plans, flowers, and cakes. I am due to come back in a months’ time once I have finalized things with the castle venue.

We leave and go down into the train station to catch a train back to the airport. We need to get back to London for important meetings later in the day. The woman is some kind of lawyer and is working for/with me. As we go down to the platform, I see SF my old university flat mate. I say hello to him and ask if he recognises me. He says yes but that he would prefer not to have anything to do with me because I am unsettling and cause chaos. I say to him that that was all well over fifteen years ago and not as recent as he remembers it. I bid him farewell and we head off onto our platform which is starting to fill.

SF comes towards us on the platform and says that yes it was well over fifteen years and how time flies. He asks me what I am up to now. I say that I have a patent pending for a light source and that I have been mulling over a design for a UV light source an EUV laser. In principle there is no reason why a cavity could not be designed. I indicate the young woman who is with me as my assistant and attorney. He says that he has something he wants to show me and that I am just the right kind of person to discuss. He asks if we can take a later flight. Yes.

We then drive off in a big expensive 4X4 to an industrial site out of town. He undoes the chains on a gate and drives us in. We go into a big hanger. He explains that he has been working on biphotonic bioluminescent device. He has found that a certain type of bioluminescence produces two photons and wonders if it could be turned into some kind of dye laser. He shows me various glass flasks in which there is a clear liquid emitting in the near ultraviolet / blue part of the spectrum. The light is making the white paper behind the flask fluorescence. He says that there is only one problem. The plant which produces the bioluminescent material is carnivorous. It has mutated to attack humans.  Down on the warehouse floor there are various large plants growing. Some are being tended.

We go down and get close. One of the plants divides and a part of it starts to chase SF. It reminds me of a triffid. He hits it with a stick and calls an aid. It is getting a bit out of hand. He says that he will be in contact and to take any one of the cars from the yard. They all have a key in them and belong to him. He says to leave it at the airport and one of his guys will pick it up later. We select a silver-grey Hummer quasi military SUV and head off to the airport.

Dream ends.

Patent Attorney Dream 8-12-17

~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

I go back to bed for a snooze after breakfast, my body is tired after Aikido last night and the logs the day before. It is very unusual to dream in these snoozes.

I am in my garden, with a small house and a wooden fence. I go through the gate at the end of the garden onto the footpath that runs behind all the houses. The footpath is on the edge of hill which overlooks a large lake. The water in the lake is clear and azure blue. To the side of the big lake is a smaller similar coloured lake. From where I am standing I can see fish swimming in the lake. It is a clear sunny day of indeterminate season.

I go back into the garden and my sister has a telescopic fishing rod which looks to be a bit tangled with fishing line. I say, that was just what I was thinking. Let’s go and see if we can catch some fish. She follows with the rod. Attached to it are two pike fishing plugs. I say we won’t be needing these. We can find some hooks later. I have half a loaf of sliced bread. I start to roll some of the bread into balls and throw it from the hill into the water. It seems to attract the fish. But my throwing is off. I decide to go down to the lake.

At the edge of the lake I throw some bread balls in. The smaller fish are attracted. I then try to throw the bread out to where the bigger fish are. These are also attracted to the bread.

I go over to the smaller lake. To my surprise there are two women swimming in the lake. They are wearing fashionable, expensive, swimsuits. They are tall and athletic. I ask them what the water is like, one says cold. Just as I am asking I fall into the water fully clothed. The water is fine. One of them swims close to me and in a slightly sexually provocative manner. We talk for a bit and I can hear that she has an accent. We go over to the shallows and the two women get out as do I. They have to get back to work.

I ask them where they are from, Germany, south, I suggest. Yes one is German and the other Russian. I ask them why they are here. They are working, both of them, in patents, one is writing a patent and the other is a patent attorney.  I say to them, in the dream, that I pay particular attention to strange things and explore them. Two women working in patents in a lake is a strange thing, and because they are German, this is even stranger.

I ask them how they feel about living in the UK. It is OK they say. It isn’t very modern but green and has nice trees. I say that Germany has all changed since the reunification.

Dream ends.