QUESTION
Can a material be patented for use in a specific industry?
Asked on Oct 07th, 2011 on Patents - Michigan
More details to this question:
My company is looking at creating a crown made entirely out of Zirconia, a material commonly used in adult dentistry because of its long-term durability. There are currently 2 manufactures of zirconia crowns in the pediatric dental industry and I’d like to make sure we’re not going to face a patent lawsuit. Zirconia has been used in Dentistry for several years, so it’s really prior art, but until recently it was never used in pediatrics (aka periodontics). We would of course design our own crown and manufacturing process, but as far as I can tell from the patent submission for one competitor, they are trying to patent the use in pediatrics. Considering there are already two zirconia based pediatric crowns, I’m pretty confident we’d be okay, but I’d like feedback.
2 ANSWERS
It is impossible to tell you if your crown design and manufacturing process can be patented without knowing what other patents are out there and what the prior art is. It would be best to consult a patent attorney or have a patent search done.
Answered on Oct 10th, 2011 at 3:59 PM
Patent Prosecution Attorney serving Troy, MI
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The best practice in your situation would be to have a patent attorney determine whether the two patents in question are valid and enforceable. Assuming that they are the attorney can evaluate your proposed design against the claims in the respective patents. If your design is clearly in public domain, the two patents should not be an issue. However since this is a fact-sensitive matter, you must have your attorney guide you in this process. Pending applications can be handled in a similar fashion to determine if you fall outside the scope of the pending claims. The scope of the claims will probably be modified during the scope of prosecution so the course of this pending application should be monitored during prosecution.
Answered on Oct 07th, 2011 at 5:21 PM