Our Process

The Initial Office Consultation

An initial consultation with the attorneys at our firm is not just a simple meet and greet.

At our initial meeting, our goal is to gather as much information about your matter as possible so we can provide you with a plan of action. Our patent attorneys have years of experience. We look at every new matter, whether an invention or business idea, with a wide view ranging from not only protecting your intellectual property but also the business side as well.

We represent and advise clients in a wide range of transactional matters that relate to intellectual property, such as:

  • Protecting New Inventions;
  • Marketing and Manufacturing Inventions;
  • Starting a New Businesses;
  • Purchasing an Existing business;
  • Purchasing a Franchise;
  • Licensing an Invention or a Trademark; and
  • Business Law.
Our Process for Client Patent, Trademark and Copyright Property | Livingston Law, P.A.

We also represent and advise clients in a wide range of adversarial matters that relate to intellectual property, such as:

  • Patent Infringement;
  • Trademark Infringement;
  • Copyright Infringement;
  • Theft of Trade Secrets;
  • Domain Name Disputes; and
  • Franchise Disputes.

We want you to leave our first meeting with a full understanding of the process so you can make an informed decision about proceeding. In turn, we need to have a full understanding of your intellectual property matter so we can adequately represent you and advise you. We prefer to meet in person, however, we can work over the phone and through email if necessary.

We Dedicate our Intellectual Property Practice To Protecting our Client's Best Ideas

Schedule A Consultation

Livingston Law assists clients nationwide, throughout the state of Florida and Southwest Florida, including Naples, Fort Myers, and Sarasota surrounding communities. Contact our offices today to discuss your questions with a lawyer by calling our toll-free number or send us a message below.

Schedule A Consultation to Protection and Enforce Your Idea | Livingston Law, P.A.

Due Diligence Searches

Prior to proceeding with the patent process, investing in a name, purchasing a business, purchasing a franchise or investing in any other type of venture, it is important to do your homework.

The first step after the initial office consultation is for our attorneys to perform the necessary due diligence to ensure you will not be wasting your time and money in proceeding with your venture and/or possibly setting yourself up for a lawsuit by unknowingly infringing a third party.

For inventions, our patent attorneys perform an international patentability and market search to determine that your invention is patentable. Our patent search may save you from investing in the patent process, the costs of taking the invention to market and liability when the invention is unpatentable to begin with and/or infringing an already issued patent. All of our patent searches are performed in-house so nothing is lost in translation from your initial office consultation to the time the patent search is performed. After the patent search is performed, we sit down with you to go over the search, our opinion and your options for proceeding. Finally we provide you with a written opinion regarding the patentability of your invention so that, if our opinion is positive, you can free comfortable moving forward with the patent process.

For trademarks, an exhaustive search is also required prior to proceeding with a name for a product or a business. Trademark litigation is highly prevalent with parties fighting over the rights to names. It is our goal to help clients avoid expensive trademark infringement litigation by ensuring a name is available prior to actually using the name. A thorough trademark search requires a search and review of federal, state by state and common law uses of confusingly similar names that could pose potential problems. This analysis and resulting opinion is then backed with a written opinion to insulate you from liability or willful infringement.

Due diligence is also necessary when investing in a patent or existing business, purchasing a business or franchise, or investing in other similar ventures. Our attorneys, are experienced in conducting intellectual property audits and reviewing existing agreements, such as franchise documents, so you can be fully informed of any possible pitfalls prior to investing in a new venture.

Protection

There may be multiple forms of protection available to you, such as utility patents, design patents, trademarks, service marks, copyrights and trade secrets.

The forms of protection available depend on your unique matter and the findings during the due diligence and searching phase. Many of these forms of protection may be overlapping. For example, software may be protected using each form of protection listed and requires specific contracts with developers to ensure you own the copyrights. Many businesses, such as a restaurants and other service based industries, will have a name that is protectable by filing federal and state trademark applications. Businesses may also have trade secrets, such as formulas, business methods, customer lists, pricing lists and so forth that need to be protected through the use of employment agreements and nondisclosures/confidentiality agreements.

It is our goal to identify each form of protection available to you and to advise you on the pros and cons of seeking each form of protection. This will allow you to make an educated decision on which forms to pursue as well as identifying the steps you need to take within your business to protect your intellectual property going forward.

In cases involving patents, trademarks and copyrights, the first step is preparing and filing the application. This can be an involved process, especially with regard to patents, wherein we work closely with clients to ensure no details are missed in the forms of protection and that their applications are as thorough as possible.

After filing the application, you move into the prosecution phase wherein the application is examined by the appropriate governmental agency, such as the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) or the Library of Congress. The examination phase normally requires going back and forth with the examiner assigned to your application prior to the application being allowed. We work closely with the examiners during this phase, often speaking to them directly, to ensure your application has the best chance possible of being issued as a patent, trademark registration and/or copyright registration.

In cases involving trade secrets, we ensure you have the necessary agreements and contracts in place with employees, independent contractors and other third parties to ensure you own whatever is created and to maintain your confidential information as “trade secrets.”

Profiting

Our main goal in bringing an invention to market or pursuing a business idea is to make a profit.

Livingston Law’s intellectual property attorneys are here to assist you beyond the protection phase so you can be successful. Our law firm can advise and assist you with the following services:

  • Obtaining Prototypes;
  • Manufacturing Inventions;
  • Marketing Inventions through various platforms, such as through traditional brick and mortar retailers and online retailers;
  • Licensing inventions to companies who will pay a royalty for the right to manufacture and market the invention;
  • Forming and structuring a corporation and/or limited liability company (LLC) for your new business.
  • Forming and structuring a corporation and/or limited liability company (LLC) so you can bring on investors;
  • Forming and structuring a corporation and/or limited liability company (LLC) so you can protect your intellectual property and other assets;
  • Franchising your business;
  • Copyright Infringement;
  • Theft of Trade Secrets;
  • Domain Name Disputes; and
  • Franchise Disputes.

Our years of experience and knowledge allow us to guide you through the entire process from the conception of an idea to the execution of the idea.

Enforcement

After you are on the market, you are bound to have competitors attempt to copy you both intentionally and unintentionally. We assist you with enforcing you patents, trademarks, copyrights and other intellectual property rights from infringers.

Our goal is to stop the infringement quickly with as little cost to you as possible. Our experience bringing and defending infringement lawsuits assists us in this goal. A lawsuit should be the last step in enforcing your intellectual property rights. We can sit down with you and put forth a strategy to stop an infringement through the use of cease and desist letters, issuing take down notices to online retailers and other alternative methods that are more efficient than litigation. If you have taken the proper steps through the due diligence phase and protection phase, then it will be easier to enforce your intellectual property rights.

That being said, we have experience bringing and defending both simple and complex infringement matters relating to patents, trademarks and copyrights and we will fight for you in court if necessary.

Maintenance

After you have gone through the process of applying for and obtaining a patent or trademark registration, it is necessary to maintain those registrations so they do not go expire or go abandoned prematurely. For example, patent maintenance fees must be paid to the USPTO during the fourth, eighth and twelfth year of the life of the patent. Likewise for trademarks, fees and declarations of continued use must be filed during fifth year and the tenth year of the trademark registration and then every ten years after that.

Obviously, many years pass between these deadlines so they are easy to forget and/or miss. Therefore, we calendar these deadlines and send you reminders, as well as prepare and file the necessary documents to ensure you do not lose your valuable patent and trademark rights.

The Attorney You Want On Your Side

40+ Years of Experience

Contact us today to discuss your copyright questions with an attorney. If you would like to send us an e-mail, simply complete and submit the online form below.

We Protect, Enforce and Help Maintain Your Creativity