INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

GENG 460 ENGINEERING LAW
INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY FINAL ASSIGNMENT
To complete this assignment you MUST work in teams of no more than 2 students.
An integral part of any patent application is a patent search. This can be conducted at the
website of the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO.GOV). The specific search location
is:
https://www.uspto.gov/patents-application-process/search-patents
To complete this assignment, you will need to pick a simple everyday item (as an example, a
“paper clip” but you cannot use “paper clip” for this assignment) and through your efforts, you
will need to develop a patent history for that item.
NOTE: You will need to search back as far as 1790.
NOTE: Patents issued before 1976 must be searched by classification.
This will entail searching the Patent Office site to locate as many patents as possible that tell the
history of the item.
This is anything but trivial. You are expected to spend time and effort learning how to use the
site, determining the classification (and subclassifications) of the item and then examining
patents to determine which patents best represent the evolution from the first patent issued until
the current and most recent patent.
What to turn in:
Your work will consist of a 1-2 page writeup that describes the patent history of the item and
describes how the item has evolved over time. In that writeup, you will reference the patents you
describe by patent number and date.
The writeup will be followed by an appendix with screenshots of the front pages and figures that
show the evolution of the item that you chose to search.
To get a grade of A, your work must be thorough and detailed. If I search your item and find
earlier patents or other relevant patents, the highest grade possible will be a B. When I look
through your appendix I should see the first patent filed on the item and I should see examples of
how the item changed and evolved over time as well as different implementations of the item.
You are not expected to find every patent but enough to tell the story.
You have one week from today to complete and turn in a single PDF file containing your work.
Prior to starting your search, you must get approval for the item from the instructor. Send
the instructor an email containing the item and the names of the member of your team. The
subject line of the email should be: “GENG 465 Patent Search ITEM NAME” where item name
is replaced with the item name.
Teams will not be allowed to pick the same item as other teams and under NO circumstances are
teams to share work with any other team. Teams may help one another to learn how to use the
search site.