What is invalidity search
- 1. Sagacious IP Service Line: Invalidity Search What is Invalidity Search? Grant of a patent does not guarantee validity, since there is always a possibility of some prior- art not yet found which could potentially invalidate the patent. An invalidity or opposition search is conducted to identify such patent and non-patent documents which may impact the claims of a specific patent. This can help block patents to counter an infringement suit or establish solidity of a patent portfolio which may be useful for licensing or company acquisition. To challenge validity of a patent, the prior art could be anything which has been made available to the public anywhere in the world, before the filing date or the priority date of the application claiming the invention. Invalidation Search is usually conducted when • You are sued for patent infringement or receive a patent infringement warning, • A freedom to operate search or patent watching services finds a patent upon which your product might infringe, • You plan for patent enforcement and sue or send a warning to your competitor (in this case, the search will be a validity search for your patent), • You are required to prove value of your patent portfolio prior to licensing agreement Invalidity searches can be extremely tedious and time consuming. With other types of patent searches, it is generally enough to initially review patent documents by titles, abstracts, indexing, and figures. However with invalidity searches, it becomes imperative to evaluate and characterize details of any prior-art document which seems relevant to the patents/claims to be invalidated. Many-a-times, a relevant prior-art is not found quickly, and this could drag on the search. It only occurs occasionally that the tedious evaluation process lead to relevant findings which could be used for invalidating the patent.