Patent Claims: The Name of the Game

10/11/2023

In this month's podcast episode, we’re talking about claims – the fundamental building blocks of a patent. There simply is not a more important concept to grasp in all of patenting. As a former chief justice of the Federal Circuit once famously said, “The name of the game is the claim.” And in terms of what game you’re playing, the claims are where you separate the patents playing checkers from the patents playing chess.

This is where your patent practitioner earns their money and as you’ll learn today, also where the most costly mistakes can be born. As David Cohen, a Patently Strategic regular, has said in the past, "Ninety percent of the mental exercise in drafting patents is in the strategy of looking around corners, anticipating the future, and trying to capture as many would-be infringers as possible.” How your claims are crafted is literally the difference between a patent being an intellectual asset and a worthless stack of paper.

In this month’s episode, Ty Davis, Patent Strategy Associate here at Aurora, leads a discussion, along with our all star patent panel, delving deeply into:

Claim fundamentals
Claim drafting strategies
How to think about claims in the context of infringement
And in the game of patenting, how to move like a queen, so you’re not treated like a pawn

Ty is joined by our always exceptional group of IP experts, including:

Dr. Ashley Sloat, President and Director of Patent Strategy at Aurora
Kristen Hansen, Patent Strategist at Aurora
Dr. David Jackrel, President of Jackrel Consulting
Marie Smyth, Patent Agent, formerly with Greenberg Traurig and Meta
Porter Thames, J.D. and Patent Agent at SMU Science and Technology Law Review

Mossoff Minute: Advancing America's Interests Act

This month's Mossoff Minute, featuring Professor Adam Mossoff, looks at the poorly named Advancing America's Interests Act and its potential impact on the ITC being able to block import of products that infringe on American patents. We’re also publishing excerpts as short-form videos on Instagram Reels, YouTube Shorts, and TikTok.

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