Indiana Inventors Association

What inventor doesn’t want to make money on his invention?   No one we know.   Dave Zedonis (president, Indiana Inventors Association; principal, Z*Tech ) offered some suggestions on how to make money. • Know your innovation space. Find out what people want to buy, not just what you want to sell (ie, don’t fall helplessly in love with your invention). Find out if someone else has already invented your invention by searching for it in patents, patent applications, catalogs, advertisements, and on the internet. • Your primary objective should be to license your invention. This is easier than starting your own business and involves less risk. • Create a budget and a plan for licensing your invention. Learn as you go.   Be willing to learn, adapt, and refine your plan at every step. Spend money on important steps as you can afford them and avoid scope creep by watching your expenses. Have an exit strategy.   Not every invention can be successful in ...

Patent attorney and Indiana Super Lawyer ®   Charles Meyer kindly treated us to an update of his 2019 presentation on intellectual property: patents, trademarks, and copyrights. It’s not unusual for 60-80% of a company’s property to be intangible.   So if you are starting a business, take the advice of Shark Tank : create a business plan and protect the company’s intellectual property.   Patents If you want a patent, the most important thing to remember is: file a patent application within one year of the date your invention is first disclosed to the public .   If you wait any longer, you cannot get a patent for that invention. The two most prevalent kinds of patents are utility patents (for new, nonobvious, and useful things or methods) and design patents (for the ornamentation of manufactured things; ex. Coca Cola bottle design).   Patents for biological plants are also available. There are two routes to getting a utility patent.   An...

Inventors want to maximize profits from selling their products.   An excellent way to do this is to optimize their supply chain. A supply chain is the entire process of producing and delivering a product.   This includes obtaining raw materials, making and packaging the product, storing the product, and delivering the product to vendors and to the customer.   Logistics (making sure the right things [goods, materials, information] get to the right place at the right time) is one important link in the supply chain. Local inventor Kenton Brett told us about the benefits of attending a trade show and, in particular, what he learned about recent innovations in robotic logistics (the use of automated machines to manage a warehouse, fulfill orders, and handle materials) at the ProMat 2025 trade show in Chicago. In general, attending a good trade show is condensed learning.   An inventor working with technology displayed at the show can get new ideas and validate or ...

  One of the many joys of inventing is finding a fun new tool that helps you with your work.   Local inventor Matt Thie told us about his latest favorite – a now-affordable (~$5K) fiber laser welder that he bought on eBay. Mr. Thie bought the laser to help him clean some old car parts.   Laser ablation focused a beam of light (1064 nm wavelength) on rust to rapidly heat, vaporize, and push the rust from the underlying steel.   In just a few minutes his car parts looked new with little or no damage to the steel.   Compare that to the time and mess involved in removing rust with chemicals, grinding, or sandblasting. Mr. Thie told us about other uses for this laser .   It works on a variety of materials, including brick, metal (aluminum, copper, iron, nickel alloys, steel [carbon, galvanized, or stainless]), paper, plastic, and wood.   It removes not only rust, but also other oxides, paint, oil, ink, and grease and strips varnish from wood cabinets...

SCORE (Service Corps of Retired Executives) offers innovators a wealth of useful information and advice: mentors (specialized or general, local or from across the country, in-person or remote), events (live or recorded; in-person or online), courses (live or recorded), and business document templates.   Dave Zedonis (president, Indiana Inventors Association) shared one of SCORE’S webinars with us: IP Types and Infringement by patent attorney Michael Steel. Success of a business often depends on its tangible ideas: inventions, symbols that communicate the company to its customers, and creative expressions.   Naturally, business owners want to protect this competitive edge.   So they enlist the help of the government by getting patents, trademarks, and copyrights, which are enforced by court systems. Patents Patents are available for useful things (utility patents), for ornamentation (design patents [important for 3-D printing]), and for biological plants (plan...

No innovator is an island.   Successfully marketing an invention requires learning firsthand what people want, who those people are, and how to connect the two.   An easy and fast way to learn about those things is to attend trade shows and expos relevant to your invention.   Local inventor Kenton Brett told us about his recent experiences at the international Inspired Home Show in Chicago, IL and at the 3D Printing Expo 2024 in Carmel, IN. The annual 5-day Inspired Home Show is the largest housewares trade show in North America.   This year's attractions included keynote addresses, a hall of global innovation, an inventors' corner, a display of new products, and free food samples prepared by celebrity and award-winning chefs.   A lunchtime conversation with a stranger gave Mr. Brett insight into what his customers want. At the Carmel Clay Public Library, Jordan Goddard (owner, Indy Toy Lab ) gave a fascinating talk on the role of artificial intelligenc...