Analysis of Tea Bag Patent

Keeping on the tea obsession theme I will now analyze some claims and aspects of the tea bag patent (US 20030170345 A1). There was an original patent published in the 1940s by Doble Ralph N which mapped out the classic and old-time version of the tea bag (US 2187417 A) in which inventor Te Sheng Wang was inspired. Her new patent is entitled the "Structure of a Tea Bag" and the abstract begins by stating "an improved structure of a tea bag is disclosed." This patent only has 3 claims which will be analyzed below.

Claims	Analysis
1. An improved structure of a tea bag having a bag body containing appropriate amount of tea leaves and a cotton thread connected with a tab at one end, the other end of the cotton thread being positioned at one side of the top face of the bag body, characterized in that the bag body is corrugated which can be extended and the bag body is made from higher porosity and hydrophilic paper, and the top face of the bag body is a first porous face with loosen pores, and the center of the bag body is a second porous face with further loosen pores, thereby, the bag body provides an effective way of brewing tea.	A new and improved tea bag that maximizes the amount of leaves inside a new pouch made of a material with higher porosity and hydrophilic paper. There are three layers of porous paper and each further loosens the tealeaves to make the best cuppa!
2. The tea bag of claim 1, wherein the top face of the bag body is provided with only a first porous face, facilitating the fabricating process of the tea bag.	The first of the three layers is a porous material that allows the water to initially loosen the tealeaves before infiltrating the next layers.
3. The tea bag of claim 1, wherein the configuration of the bag body is a square base body, hexagonal shape base body and an octagonal shape base body so as to fully utilize the capacity of the bag body.	There are three variety’s of the porous tea bags; hexagon base, octagon shape, and square base that maximize space to tealeaf ratio.

Analyzing the Electric Kettle

To say that I am obsessed with tea is an understatement, so today I will be analyzing the claims within the patent US7145105 B2, the Electric Kettle. This patent was filed on July 9th, 2003 and finally published on December 5th, 2006 and was invented by Hervé Gaulard (thank you Hervé!).

Overall, this patent maps out the different proponents of what makes Hervé's kettle unique and patentable. Some parts include the power supply base, a manual control knob, and a reservoir. The patent has a total of 17 claims and I will be analyzing a handful of those claims below.

Claims	Analysis
3. Kettle according to claim 1, characterized in that the transmission means include transmission elements housed in the power supply base, movable between a resting position and an activation position in which the manual control button is in the activation position, and complementary transmission elements housed in the receptacle, movable between a resting position and an activation position in which the transmission elements are in the activation position and the switch is in the closed position, with the receptacle being connected to the power supply base.	The supply base is able to turn on and off (supply electricity and stop electric flow) in accordance to the manual knob (on-off switch).
4. Kettle according to claim 3, characterized in that the transmission elements include a lever pivotably mounted with respect to the power supply base of which a first end is attached to the manual control button, and the second end is suitable for driving the complementary transmission elements towards their activation position.	The on-off switch is correctly linked to the supply base so when switched on the transmission of electricity is activated.
9. Kettle according to claim 1, characterized in that the manual control button is constantly urged towards its resting position by a spring.	There is a spring in the on-off button that makes it so it cannot turn on without the operator flipping the switch.

What I found most interesting with these claims is that they seem repetitive and redundant but each claim is in fact something slightly different and it shows just how important specificity is in these patents. The inventor must map out each tiny detail of his or her invention to prevent others finding a way around it, thus the inventor will be able to sue more easily in the case of an infringement. I also never knew how much goes into inventions that I use on a day to day basis.

http://www.google.com/patents/US7145105

Samsung vs Apple

Samsung unveiled its Galaxy S7 smartphone and now two of the biggest and most influential tech companies in the world are arguing in court about a patent infringement all over again. Samsung and Apple have been going back and forth in the patent courts for threes years now about their iPhone and Galaxy phones spanning from courts in Germany, Japan, South Korea, and many more. Apple’s accusations against Samsung started something called the ‘smartphone patent wars’, which is defined as the “extensive litigation in fierce competition in the global market for consumer mobile communications.” By July 2012 they two companies were litigating over 50 lawsuits around the world with damages in the billions of dollars. However, unlike the previous VirnetX vs Apple case, we are now playing in the big leagues. Neither company is what one would consider a “patent troll” and these accusations in many ways have a much more legitimate standing than VirnetX’s case. Both companies produce and sell products that are used by a vast majority of the people in our world and the technologies being used are beginning to blur.

Over the years, the main aspect that has been discussed was the pinch-to-zoom feature on their touch screens. This feature allows users to zoom in and out on photos and articles and lets you zoom in when taking photos or videos. Its used incredibly frequently by all users so that’s why the infringement accusations are so serious and debated. In the end, the court ruled that Samsung has to pay $548 million in damages to Apple due to this pinch zoom feature infringement. However, this ‘smartphone patent war’ between the two spearheading companies is far from being over because Samsung can file for an appeal and take this case to the Supreme Court. If this case goes all the way up to the big guys then this case will go down as a landmark patent infringement case and may change the way our technological world function forever.

VirnetX vs Apple: The Full Details

Like I stated before, VirnetX is what people call a Patent Troll, which by definition means "a person or company that attempts to enforce patent rights against accused infringers far beyond the patent's actual value or contribution to the prior art. Patent trolls often do not manufacture products or supply services based upon the patents in question." Aka, a company that makes money just by suing other companies (like Apple, Microsoft, and Cisco) and honestly do nothing else besides that.

Apple has been a big target for VirnetX starting in 2012 when they sued them over VPN (virtual private network) patents in their FaceTime software. At the time they were forced to pay $368million in infringement damages but Apple appealed the case and won on a technicality. After the appeal the jury saw no direct linkage between Apple’s "infringed" FaceTime software and their sales of iPads/iPhones that used the software. But VirnetX didn't give up and came back harder this time around. They started out with the accusations of patents numbered 7,490,151 and 6,502,135 in which the court forced apple to pay an initial $335 million. However, after further investigation they concluded that patents numbered 7,921,211 and 7,418,504 were also being violated through Apple's FaceTime software and Apple was then forced to pay an additional $291 million in damages. Rounding out the total to a whopping $625 million from patent infringements. However, that money is just a drop in the bucket for Apple, a company who's last quarterly revenue of $74.6 billion. They could pay VirnetX this money and go about their days like nothing even happened. But Apple doesn't want to stand for these, amongst other, patent trolls anymore. They are going to appeal yet again under the claims that the four patents at stake have been declared invalid. They are doing this to make a statement that these companies are doing nothing but harm to the technology industry and must be stopped. Patent trolls are prohibiting and slowing down technological process through their stringent ideals and money driven mindset.

Apple vs VirnetX Lawsuit (round 2)

The case between VirnetX (a specialized holding company) and Apple (you know who they are) is the biggest news in the patent world right now. For the second time in five years VirnetX is suing Apple for infringement on four of their eighty patents, which were bought from the Science Applications International Corporation. The patents are as follows:

1)  U.S. Patent #6,502,135 (“135 patent”): Agile network protocol for secure communications with assured system availability

2)  U.S. Patent #7,418,504 (“504 patent”): Agile network protocol for secure communications using secure domain names

3)  U.S. Patent #7,490,151 (“151 patent”): Establishment of a secure communication link based on a domain name service (DNS) request

4)   U.S. Patent #7,921,211 (“211 patent”): Agile network protocol for secure communications using secure domain names

Basically, these four patents are based around "real time communication" which is used in Apple software like FaceTime and iMessage. And unfortunately for Apple (but very fortunately for VirnetX), an East Texas Jury finally came to the conclusion that Apple was guilty of the infringement allegations and are now being forced to pay VirnetX $625 million in damages. A whole $102 million more than VirnetX originally wanted. On top of that, after their win, VirnetX’s shares more than doubled. 

To put this in perspective, VirnetX is a company of fourteen employees and work out of an office where they only pay $5,000 per month. So this is a ginormous win for them. In the past, these patent trollers have sued and won against Microsoft for $200 million in 2010 and then again, filed another lawsuit against the company in 2015. But they lost a patent case it brought against Cisco last year, so they went back to the big boys at Apple for another round.