Indiana Inventors Association

  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 (eg, see here ). 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 fr...

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...

Randy Landreneau (president, US Inventor; president, Complete Product Development) and Dirk Tomsin (director of projects, US Inventor; co-owner, CrossFit Untapped) gave us reason to think that our patent system is too unstable for individual inventors. Inventing and marketing a product take effort, insight, money, and time.   Innovators want to be reimbursed or rewarded for their investment in helping others.   Our government knows that a thriving economy depends on inventions.   So to keep inventions coming, it rewards inventors with patents —legal protection from market competition for a limited time in exchange for sharing the invention with the public.   This protection consists of courts and a legal structure that are meant to help inventors repel competitors.   Innovators need this protection to be stable so they can estimate the costs, benefits, and risks of starting a new business.   Unfortunately patents are too often unstable. Molly Metz ...

Inventors now have a new way to advertise their inventions.   Craig Whitcomb told us about his new creation, Remarkable Venture . Mr. Whitcomb recommends that an inventor build the value of his invention by moving through 11 steps .       1) Start by identifying a problem worth solving: relevant to the customers you want, solvable, and marketable.       2) Invent a rough draft of a solution to that problem, a proof of concept showing that a final solution is feasible.       3) Find out if someone else already marketed your solution.   Search sites, such as Amazon.com or the Internet Archive , for products similar to your solution/invention.       4) Find out if someone else already patented your invention.   Search sites, such as Patent Public Search or Free Patents Online , for claims that define inventions similar to yours.   ...

For an independent inventor, especially one new to an industry, there is no place better to learn and to network than a professional trade show (a large public display that promotes awareness and sales of new products within a particular industry).   Inventor Kenton Brett unpacked for us many of the benefits this tool offers. • Meet people who can help you. Engage with anyone who wants to interact with you.   Everyone there wants to do business and you never know who might be able to help you.   Someone who might become your friend, business partner, or client; who can answer your questions (now or later); who can connect you to the industry and make you feel like an insider; or who can give you a contract. There are no company gatekeepers at a trade show, so it is often easy to talk with a company’s leaders.   Scan the exhibitor directory to see who might share your interests (maybe the president or head of marketing of a company), note where their exhibit...