Patent Listing

[Syed Zaeem Hosain (Syed.Hosain@aeris.net)]

I *entirely* agree with the public use of trademark and logo attributions - the specific method, design, figure, wording, etc., is driven by the company who owns them. These are often described in *public* documents by those companies (see Oracle, Google and Microsoft web sites for examples).

However, licensing a patent from a third-party and incorporating that intellectual property in your own product is quite different. Documentation should not generally require specific attribution. Indeed, that business agreement may be one that needs to be relatively confidential.

So, I would suggest that it is sufficient to say "... are protected by patents: XXX, XXX, XXX" that _includes_ the licensed patent and leave it at that.

Most importantly, ask your *own* lawyers (internal or otherwise) for the specific policy that they may already have ... 

Z

-----Original Message-----
From: framers-bounces at lists.frameusers.com [mailto:framers-bounces at lists.frameusers.com] On Behalf Of Combs, Richard
Sent: Thursday, August 23, 2012 3:50 PM
To: Alison Craig; framers at lists.frameusers.com
Subject: RE: Patent Listing

Alison Craig wrote: 
 
> I have been given a new patent to list in my documentation - but it's 
> a patent we have legal permission to use. It does not belong to us.
> 
> Per the attached, all of our patents are listed on title pages and in 
> a Chapter 1 section called (unsurprisingly) Trademarks and Patents (in 
> tiny documents without cover and title pages, the patents are included 
> in the first page footer).
> 
> My first inclination is to list the 3rd party patent only in manuals 
> with the Chapter 1 Trademarks and Patents section - something like 
> "The following third party patents are used in SonixGPS(tm) software: xxxxxxx."
> (Note that SonixGPS(tm) will be added to the Ultrasonix trademark list 
> before the next manual release.)
> 
> Does anyone have any patent "credit" experience that could shed some 
> light on how to handle this? As I haven't actually been given the name 
> of the company from whom we "licensed" use of this patent, I can't 
> include it. Am I supposed to?

Who gave you this task? Do they expect you just to insert the patent number? Yes, you need to specify the name of the company from whom you licensed this. 

In general, a company from which you license technology will have specific requirements for what your company must do regarding the license and any associated trademarks. For instance, we use the Java Platform in our products, and Oracle requires that the Java logo and trademark acknowledgement be included in all docs in a very specific manner and that the Java license terms be appended to our end user license agreement (EULA) so that our customers are aware of and bound by Oracle's license terms. 

Does your product have a EULA? Do you have a legal department that can guide you? These aren't things you should just make up. 

Richard G. Combs
Senior Technical Writer
Polycom, Inc.
richard.combs at polycom.com
303-223-5111
------
rgcombs at gmail.com
303-903-6372
------






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