{"id":7571,"date":"2005-07-05T08:55:54","date_gmt":"2005-07-05T06:55:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aidb.it\/latests-news\/patents-these-mysterious-objects\/"},"modified":"2026-07-16T12:05:44","modified_gmt":"2026-07-16T10:05:44","slug":"patents-these-mysterious-objects","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aidb.it\/en\/latests-news\/patents-these-mysterious-objects\/","title":{"rendered":"Patents: These &#8220;Mysterious Objects&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"Stile1\">  Patents, these <em>&#8220;mysterious objects&#8221;*<\/p>\n<p>*(At least as far as Italy is concerned)<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<p><em>Article by <strong>Bruno Rimoldi<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Introduction<\/em><br \/>\n<strong>Telling AIDB members about the importance of patents and the need to understand them in order to make the best use of them\u2014as well as to educate themselves\u2014would be like preaching to the choir and might even come across as \u201cmaking fun of them.\u201d<br \/>\n<\/strong>But I still believe it could be useful to discuss patents on our website, especially if the goal is to reach\u2014in a straightforward, non-technical way\u2014people who, in one way or another, come into contact with our association.<\/p>\n<p>When a new, revolutionary car (at least according to the manufacturer) was launched a few years ago, the thing that most caught the attention of readers of the newspaper that ran the article was the phrase in the headline: \u201c&#8230; a small city car with 50 patents becomes one of a kind.\u201d<br \/>\nThe journalist (or, more likely, the \u201cheadline writer\u201d) had rightly wanted to point out to readers just how much \u201cprotected\u201d technology lay behind that product.<br \/>\n<strong>Patents are, in fact, public legal documents through which new industrially applicable inventions can be protected, granting their owners (companies, corporations, individuals) the exclusive right to use what is described, illustrated, and claimed therein\u2014either by implementing it directly or by licensing it to third parties.<\/strong><br \/>\nAlthough filing a patent does not automatically constitute an impenetrable bulwark against attempts at infringement, a patent is still the most appropriate legal weapon at one\u2019s disposal, facilitating defensive and offensive actions by providing definitive dates and official documents to present against third parties.<br \/>\nFurthermore, patents (inventions, designs, trademarks) are company assets that should be properly leveraged and, in any case, must be defended through appropriate investments.<br \/>\n<strong>The most important thing, however, is to file them whenever an innovation is created<\/strong>; but to make the best use of them, it is essential to understand at least their basic characteristics. Unfortunately, our country\u2014a land of navigators, artists, and inventors\u2014lacks a \u201cpatent culture.\u201d Inventors\u2014whether they work within a company or are independent\u2014even when they create technologically and commercially viable \u201cinnovations,\u201d do not always have a clear understanding of how to protect them<br \/>\nadequately and, in general, either underestimate or overestimate both the invention itself and the legal means to protect it. In some cases, this leads to paradoxical consequences: inventions effectively given away to competitors because they are not adequately protected; a multitude of foreign patents licensed due to the inadequacy of the national \u201cpatent portfolio\u201d; and, at times, even investments made in response to nonexistent \u201cexclusive rights.\u201d<strong><br \/>\nThe lack of attention to\u2014and consequently the limited use of\u2014patenting is certainly a problem felt more acutely by us, where the productive base consists of small and medium-sized artisanal and industrial enterprises that, by prudently using patents, designs, and trademarks to protect their creativity, could improve their respective sectoral performance.<\/strong><br \/>\nUnfortunately, the lack of knowledge about patents\u2014what they are and how to use them\u2014among those who drive innovation still leads to limited use of legal protection (patenting) for their inventions in Italy. And sometimes patents are not filed simply because people are convinced that a patent is of little value or that it involves too high a cost. But this limited use of patenting has contributed, along with other factors, to placing Italy near the bottom of the list of industrialized nations. <strong><br \/>\nLearning more as soon as possible therefore helps to best define the strategy to adopt for adequately protecting one\u2019s innovations, minimizing the risk of risky or wrong decisions, and helping the inventor make the most of the exclusivity granted by a valid patent.<\/strong><br \/>\nThe judicious use of patents to protect one\u2019s innovations can also make the difference between one company and another; in fact, a \u201cleading\u201d company is almost always one that, in addition to being innovative in its sector, has from the very beginning correctly used patents to adequately protect and defend its innovations and has continuously innovated and protected them, investing as much as necessary to maintain a sufficient lead over the competition.<br \/>\nHowever, to adequately protect one\u2019s inventions, it is extremely important to take due account of the prior <strong>\u201cstate of the art,\u201d<\/strong> which consists primarily of all prior patent documents filed and published anywhere.<br \/>\nA wealth of texts, drawings, claims, examples, and diagrams: a treasure trove of vital information on what others have already conceived. In fact, the publication of patent documents as early as the application stage (i.e., before a patent is granted) is required by various laws precisely to allow interested third parties to learn, as soon as possible, what has already been the subject of a patent application, to avoid duplicating experiments that have already been conducted and, at the same time, to avoid infringing on inventions that are already protected. Precisely because this prior art is documented in its various aspects and made available to all interested parties, it is unthinkable that an innovator would fail to consult it. Access to this documentation is also essential for analyzing what has been patented previously\u2014not only in one\u2019s own country but also in other nations\u2014in order to properly assess the novelty of one\u2019s own invention and to draft one\u2019s patent accordingly. Patent documents also contain information regarding innovations that have never been implemented and are therefore not detectable at trade shows, in catalogs, or in other types of publications; these innovations are nonetheless documentable and thus can no longer be claimed as new and exclusive in subsequent patents by anyone, regardless of where they are filed.<br \/>\nDoing your research before filing a patent\u2014and in any case before investing in research to develop a \u201cnew\u201d invention\u2014is of fundamental importance for all businesses, regardless of their size or the industry in which they operate. Discovering, \u201cafter\u201d having invested in research, advertising, patents, etc., that one\u2019s innovation cannot guarantee any exclusivity\u2014or, worse, that what was thought to be one\u2019s own original creation is covered by a valid patent held by others\u2014is not only unpleasant but also very, very costly.<br \/>\nInnovation can arise in any industrial sector\u2014and beyond\u2014often on a small scale, though sometimes on such a grand scale that it revolutionizes certain processes, rendering obsolete equipment that had previously been considered irreplaceable\u2014even if this, of course, only happens when the innovation is economically viable.<br \/>\nThe fact that there are prior patents\u2014and there almost always are, that is, innovations developed by others\u2014means, as mentioned earlier, that it is necessary to conduct research based on the \u201cstate of the art\u201d even before beginning to design a \u201cnew\u201d solution.<br \/>\nOf course, it\u2019s not easy to navigate all the available material to set up the search that best suits your specific case. It is therefore advisable to rely on patent search experts\u2014that is, professionals who routinely conduct patent searches and are therefore able to guide and assist those interested by initiating the most appropriate \u201ctargeted\u201d search or set of searches on their behalf.   <em><strong>Bruno Rimoldi <\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>The ideas and opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official position of AIDB.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Patents, these &#8220;mysterious objects&#8221;* *(At least as far as Italy is concerned) Article by Bruno Rimoldi Introduction Telling AIDB members about the importance of patents and the need to understand them in order to make the best use of them\u2014as well as to educate themselves\u2014would be like preaching to the choir and might even come [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7571","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-latests-news"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.0 - 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