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Hello, I was wondering about protecting your drawn up ideas. I am trying to build a machine but need a little input from a engineer. I have drawing but I am cautious about showing him my idea just in case he runs with it as his own. On my drawing I have the date from when they were sketched and have a third party that knows I have been working on this for about 6 months now. Is that enough to protect my idea or would I have to have him sign a non-disclosure to be safer? Thank you for your time, BL
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It would be safer to get a non-disclosure signed. Keep in mind as well that US patent laws changed significantly with the America Invents Act. It used to be beneficial for the invention priority date to keep dated records showing time of invention. Now, the US is a first-to-file jurisdiction. If you came up with the idea six months ago and I came up with it yesterday, but I file a patent application tomorrow and you file in another month, I am entitled to the patent rights and you are not. If you are concerned about getting a patent, I would do what you need to do to get a provisional patent application filed as soon as the machine concept is complete enough to put something on file. Having a provisional application on file is safer than an executed non-disclosure for patent right purposes.
Answered on Nov 05th, 2013 at 8:32 AM