What Is a Patent?
A patent is an exclusive right granted by the United States (or a foreign government) that allows you to prevent other parties from using, making, selling, offering to sell, or importing your invention for a limited amount of time.
In the United States, the term of a patent is 20 years from the date the patent application is filed. After the term of the patent, anyone may use the invention for any purpose without accounting to the patent rights holder.
To obtain a patent for an invention, you must file a patent application within the country in which you wish to obtain protection and successfully demonstrate to the patent office that your invention is novel, non-obvious, useful for a particular purpose, and required an inventive step to develop.
Patent rights are particularly valuable to companies since they limit the ability of others within their industry to directly compete with their products and/or services.
OLV markets and licenses Duke-owned patent rights to companies to enable the production and sale of products based on these inventions.
Related Content
Types of Patents Available in the United States