On December 13, 2011, Rick Michaud and John Mutchler conducted a webinar in conjunction with the U.S. Department of Commerce, International Trade Administration division entitled “Patent Your Products”.  To view a replay of the webinar, please check out the following link: “Patent Your Products” Webinar If you have any questions, please feel free to contact Rick Michaud (michaud@mkgip.com) [...]

 By his signature on September 19, 2011, President Obama enacted the most sweeping changes to U.S. patent Law in over fifty years.  The Leahy-Smith America Invents Act (“the Act”) changes many aspects of U.S. Patent law that will impact inventors, patent owners and patent attorneys.  A brief summary of some of the most important [...]

MKG was chosen to be profiled in the July 27th edition of the Hartford Advocate’s “Best of 2011” profile series.  Check out the link or pick up your copy of the Hartford Advocate on newsstands now!   http://www.proactiveresources.com/Media/BestofHartford_072711.htm  

Last fall, the USPTO announced a goal of reducing the amount of patent applications awaiting a first office action.  The goal was to reduce the backlog to less than 700,000 applications.  Last week, USPTO Commissioner for Patents, Bob Stoll, the USPTO has hit a “major milestone” by dropping the backlog of patent applications awaiting first office action [...]

According to reports in IPLaw 360, Women’s Wear Daily and The Washington Post, a New York Federal court has awarded Tory Burch LLC, the high end fashion designer, the largest judgment for fashion counterfeiting: $164 million.  According to IPLaw 360, the damages were awarded “after finding that operators of hundreds of websites sold knock-off versions [...]

Last month, the USPTO announced it would be studying the impact that the decision of Therasense v. Becton, Dickinson would have on the agency and its practices and procedures. You can find the press release here. The Therasense v. Becton, Dickinson Decision concerns the duty of disclosure and the standards for inequitable conduct. The decision [...]

If you happen to be in the Fairfield, CT area and would like to learn more about the fundamentals of intellectual property, please consider attending a seminar that we are conducting for the Women’s Business Development Council on June 8th at 6pm. For more information, please go to http://www.ctwbdc.org/Intellectual-Property-What-Is-It-P17C34.aspx

To celebrate the upcoming Memorial Day holiday, we searched the records of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to uncover some patriotic-themed patents. We found quite a few!  Here’s some of the light-hearted patents we uncovered. First up, US Design Patent D513578, for Cutter Tool Next up, patriotic duct tape, which can be found in U.S. [...]

If you haven’t heard, the USPTO has taken steps to be more communicative with its patrons. The USPTO Director, David Kappos, has a blog, which can be found at http://www.uspto.gov/blog/ Also, you can subscribe to various e-publications the USPTO publishes on a regular basis. To learn more about the publications and to sign up, visit [...]

Coach Inc., the famous maker of high end handbags and accessories has recently filed a lawsuit in Federal Court against Handbags Unlimited, Inc., for trademark infringement and related causes of action.  Coach Inc. has over 50 U.S. trademark and copyright registrations.  In the Complaint, Coach alleges that Handbags Unlimited is engaged in designing, manufacturing, advertising [...]