We live in a competitive environment in this technologically advanced world, so you should try to patent your invention to safeguard your intellectual property. If you are developing a customized mobile application, you must patent app ideas and stay out of the competition.
Apps vary from widgets and t-shirts in that they can only be used on mobile devices, unlike widgets and t-shirts. That being said, they are nonetheless capable of fulfilling the standards for filing a patent. With this, you can prevent the theft of your app ideas. Many startup founders and business owners have already trademarked their mobile app ideas to prevent competitors from stealing their app concepts.
In addition, if your app concept is comparable to an existing app, all your hard work will be for nothing. Therefore, you must have the certainty of its originality and uniqueness.
In this guide, we will cover everything you need to know about patenting an app idea. We will go over the patent process in detail.
Let’s start!
What does Patent Apps Mean?
A patent is a right given to the inventors for an invention, an app, or a technique that offers a new way of doing something or a new tech solution to a problem. Technical information concerning the innovation must be revealed to the public in a patent application to get a patent.
The patent owner may provide permission or license to the third parties to use the solution under mutually agreed terms. The owner may also sell the right to another person, who will become the new owner of the patent apps. When a patent expires, the protection disappears, and the innovation enters the public domain, meaning that anybody can commercially use it without violating the patent.
In the tech universe, patenting unique app ideas is essential to protect them from burglary in the marketplace that may be looking for an opportunity to steal it.
Types of Patent Apps
Filing a patent means; to plea for granting a patent for the app idea. Patenting an app idea is a process that can be confusing and overwhelming. It is important to know what type of patent application you’re filing so that you don’t end up spending money on something that isn’t worth it. There are three types of Patent applications you can use to file a patent for your app idea.
Provisional Application
A provisional application is a type of temporary application that needs to be submitted to own the patent app ideas. Such patent application should be caved in when an idea requires additional time for development. Under this application, the applicant has to submit full specification of the product within a year of the filing date of the provisional application if the application is supported by one. If this step is unsuccessful, the application is void and worthless. Here are some of the benefits this application types offer:
- The applicant has a year to thoroughly develop the idea and assess its market viability.
- Helps in establishing specific rights of precedence over the innovation.
- The application gives the applicant the right to label their items as “patent pending.”
- The cost of preparing and submitting the provisional application is lower.
Non-Provisional Application
In case you’re planning to build a very unique mobile application, you can patent your app idea and overcome any sort of competition. You can do this when you want to bring market disruption and a temporary monopoly through your products and services. Moreover, if you want to generate a highly customized app to manage your organizational communication and operations, you need a patent. Likewise, you have to seek relative mobile app development services for your project.
When your business expands, it becomes a brand. To maintain your brand value further, you need to get the copyright or patent associated with your business. A patent is usually for a scientific invention and copyright is related to a work of art. You need to have a copyright of your company logo and a patent of your innovative product. So, the mobile app development services should relate to both your business copyrights and patents.
Through this post, we want you to get a detailed insight into how to patent a mobile app idea for your online business. We’ll also discuss how you can get started with a mobile app patent process and the different aspects you need to keep in mind. Instead, you can also approach an app development service provider if not available for the development procedure. Let’s get started!
Reasons Why You Need to Patent Your App Idea
First, you should make up your mind to patent your business idea. Generally, app companies are not concerned about a patent and face open competition in the market. But some companies are not supposed to go for a competitive environment and don’t target a wider customer base. They target specific customers and users and don’t want others to copy their mobile application idea. These businesses require corresponding mobile app development services.
Enlisted are some reasons why app companies decide to patent their mobile app ideas:
- App companies want to overcome competition
- Companies want to promote uniqueness through their mobile app
- App companies are coming up with a revolutionary business plan
- Protect their app idea for future growth and developments
- The company can file a case of fraud against other app companies generating clones of the original app
- For generating a little monopoly in the market and contribute to the business interest
For this, the businesses should seek app development service providers who could suggest the best ways to patent a mobile app idea. The company can also research different ways on the internet to help itself find a good solution!
Things to Consider When You Patent Your Mobile Application Idea
Moving further, you have to review certain aspects when you patent your mobile app idea. These aspects can help you understand the different requirements of patent and you can implement your understanding if create more apps in the future. Let’s talk about these aspects in detail:
1. Types of Patent Applications
First, you should decide whether you want to create a provisional app patent or a non-provisional one. A provisional app patent is registered for 12 months and after that, it expires. On the other hand, a non-provisional patent lasts for a lifetime. However, its registration fees are comparatively higher.
2. A Very Unique Idea
This is one of the top requirements of your patent procedure. You must make sure that your mobile app is entirely unique and doesn’t represent a clone design or framework of some other app in the market. You can run research on various app stores before getting your mobile app registered.
3. Authorization for Usefulness
A mobile app development company can’t authorize your app as a useful one. You have to prove that your mobile app is truly useful for a specific customer group. You can’t proceed to get a patent before authorizing the usefulness of a mobile app. The patent providers want to check the feasibility of the mobile app idea you have.
4. Important List of Docs
Then comes the various important documents that you need to review before getting your app idea patented. These documents include- Declaration, Specifications, Entity Status Form, Drawings, ADS, Data Disclosure Statement, Patent Cooperation Treaty, Cover Sheet, Expense Sheet, etc.
Essential Steps to Patent a Mobile Application
Moving forward, you need to follow some important steps to patent your mobile application. A mobile app development company can also suggest or follow these steps on behalf of your mobile app business before initiating your app-building project. So, you better communicate your app patent requirement ahead of time with them. Let’s review these steps in detail:
1. Consult a Patent Attorney
A patent attorney is a lawyer who researches whether your mobile app idea is purely unique or copied. Proper fact-checking is very essential in this context or else you can face negative consequences in the future regarding your business growth. You must reach out to an experienced mobile app patent attorney for getting better results.
2. Convert Your Plan to Reality
Mobile app development services can’t help you alone to bring uniqueness to your brand value. You must convert your patent plan to reality by consulting the best lawyer and sharing your business idea with him/her. The court is going to ask for relative proves that your mobile app idea is purely unique and fresh. You can do proper documentation along with your attorney and overcome all legislative proceedings.
3. Decide on the Cost
Ultimately, you will be required to pay the cost of development. The total cost of patent filing and mobile app idea patent depends on various factors including- Review, Elementary Filling, Searching, Classification of Patent, Basic Maintenance, etc. You have to pay the fees accordingly.
4. Implement a Deep Research
You can ask your attorney to conduct proper research and analyse if there’s any sort of clone present on the app stores representing the exact copy of your mobile application. It may take nearly a week for your lawyer to find all possible loopholes in the process. You can try some other idea if the initial one is not working out.
Final Words
In this way, you can make your mobile application exceptionally unique. Mobile app development services include various forms of assistance that you need to raise your business value over different online sources. You can get in touch with a well-known app development company to know more!!
