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Disclaimer: Wetzel Chemistry Consulting, LLC cannot provide legal advice. If you have questions about your particular situation, please consult a Patent Attorney or Patent Agent.

Attention: Chemistry Department Heads

Do you have nagging concerns that patent applications filed by your department may contain critical errors that could adversely affect the value of the resulting patents?
Do you find it necessary to burden your most detail-oriented senior chemists with the task of proof-reading and correcting the writing of their colleagues so that your department can produce well-written patent applications?
Do you find yourself spending inordinate amounts of time proof-reading and correcting patent applications that were written poorly by your research staff?
Do you wish that you could find a way to keep your efforts and those of your senior staff focused on inventing and developing new technology, rather than editing documents?

If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, your situation is not unusual. In most chemistry research departments, the individual team members have widely varying talents and skills:

Some are extremely creative.
Some are efficient at reducing new ideas to practice.
Some have the excellent communication skills, affinity for details, and broad experience that are necessary for translating inventions into well-written patent applications that will result in valid and enforceable patents.
Some have excellent leadership qualities.
A few may have all of these skills and more.

Often, in order for the department to produce high quality patent applications, it is necessary for the few excellent writers in the department to spend significant portions of their precious time correcting the writing of their colleagues. Perhaps these same detail-oriented chemists could be applying their talents to something more useful, such as inventing new technology or leading project teams.

Wetzel Chemistry Consulting, LLC can help you to prepare high quality patent applications while keeping your researchers focused on research. We can work with your inventors and patent attorneys to ensure that your chemistry patent applications are crafted with skill and care. We have extensive experience in writing chemistry patent applications and a reputation for getting the details right. Contact us to discuss how we can assist you.

Your Words Are Worth Millions

The exact wording of the claims and the specification of a patent is of critical importance
Any ambiguity leaves patent coverage and validity subject to chance
Simple errors or poorly worded language can result in millions of dollars in lost value
District and Federal Circuit Court records contain many examples of lost patent value as the result of poor wording. For purposes of illustration, two such examples are described below.

Chef America v. Lamb-Weston

Chef America accused Lamb-Weston of infringing its U.S. Patent No. 4,761,290
A representative claim reads:

"A process for producing a dough product …which comprises … heating the … dough to a temperature in the range of about 400 ºF to 850 ºF" (emphasis added)

It was clear that, despite the patentee’s inadvertent mis-statement, the dough should only be heated at , not to , the specified temperature; otherwise the dough would burn and the claim would be inoperative
Lamb-Weston does not heat its dough products to the temperature range specified in Chef America’s patent and, therefore, does not literally infringe the claims as construed by the district court.
The district court granted a motion for summary judgment of non-infringement, and the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed
Both the district court and the Federal Circuit Court refused to redraft the claim to preserve its validity

“Thus, in accord with our settled practice we construe the claim as written, not as the patentees wish they had written it.” – Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Chef America, Inc. v. Lamb-Weston, Inc., 358 F.3d 1371 (Fed. Cir. 2004).

Honeywell International v. International Trade Commission

Honeywell International, Inc. accused Hyosung Corporation of Seoul, Korea and its American counterpart of importing polyethylene terephthalate yarns that infringe Honeywell's U.S. Patent No. 5,630,976, in violation of the Tariff Act of 1930.

The following is representative of the disputed portion of Honeywell's claims: “A process for production of a drawn polyethylene terephthalate yarn …, comprising: … [steps] … to form a crystalline, partially oriented yarn with … a melting point elevation of 2° to 10° C, and …"
The written description does not describe any method by which to determine the melting point elevation
The accused product was analyzed by four different methods, of which only one, the ball method, gave a melting point elevation within the claimed range
The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit determined that:
- The intrinsic record (i.e. the claims, the written description and the prosecution history) does not compel a narrowing of the claim language to any one of the possible definitions
- The intrinsic record fails to give any guidance as to what a person of ordinary skill would understand the claim to require
- Therefore, the claims are insolubly ambiguous and invalid and Hyosung does not infringe.
-- Honeywell International, Inc., v. International Trade Commission, 341 F.3d 1332 (Fed. Cir. 2003)

Say What You Mean

“I seem to be seeing a lot of what appear to be shorts on the women and not enough neckties on the men.” – quoted from a high school principal’s memo to his staff regarding professional attire

In response, one of the male teachers appeared for work the next day wearing five neckties.

In order to get what you want (for example, appropriate patent coverage for your inventions), it is important to say what you mean. Wetzel Chemistry Consulting, LLC can assist you in making sure that your patent applications describe your inventions precisely and claim them appropriately. Contact us to discuss how we can help.