“The patent system changed this; secured to the inventor, for a limited time, the exclusive use of his invention; and thereby added the fuel of interest to the fire of genius…”
— Abraham Lincoln, 1859

As America approached its 250th birthday, I started thinking that Voice of IP should mark the occasion. Most of what I discuss on Clause 8 is the machinery of the patent world — the USPTO, the Hill, the courts, corporate IP strategy, new models for monetization, etc. But that machinery exists for one reason that’s often easy to lose sight of: innovation. So I decided that Voice of IP would put together a list of 250 American innovations, one for each year of the country, each tied to a US patent. I figured it would be a quick, easy project.

It was far more complicated than I expected. But working through those complications forced me to confront the messiness of innovation, patents, business, history—and lists like this one. Many of the discoveries and disputes I encountered appear in the “Notes” column of the table below. These were the broader themes that stayed with me:

Looking back, the current state of patent eligibility seems wildly ahistorical. This is the one that made me repeatedly sit back and think about how we have ended up in a very different place from when many of the innovations on the list were patented. Google’s PageRank patent, Netflix’s DVD-by-mail patent, Elon Musk’s business directory patent for his first company Zip2, and Jack Dorsey’s patent on tweeting have mostly expired but, at the time the applications were filed, they covered technologies and business models that became foundational to some of the biggest business empires in America. If filed today, they would likely all have trouble surviving the §101 gauntlet — facing rejection at the USPTO and, if issued, possible invalidation in the courts.

The same shift appears at the other end of the technological spectrum. Cohen and Boyer’s recombinant-DNA patent helped launch the modern biotechnology industry — Stanford and UCSF licensed it to roughly 470 companies — and it issued in 1980, three decades before the Supreme Court in Myriad held that isolated genes are unpatentable products of nature. PCR became a foundational technique underlying countless modern genetic tests. But diagnostic methods built around such testing now run headlong into Mayo v. Prometheus, which in 2012 recast correlating a biomarker to optimize treatment of autoimmune diseases, like Crohn’s, as an unpatentable “law of nature.” Whether the specific claims on these foundational patents would have survived today is unclear. The country patented its way to biotech under rules it has since walked back, which is why Senators Tillis and Coons have spent years trying to restore broader statutory eligibility.

That's largely true of patents for earlier innovations on the list too. The Monopoly patent anchored Parker Brothers' fortune; today, a patent on game rules would be dead on arrival. The Piggly Wiggly patent — Clarence Saunders's "self-serving store," the ancestor of every supermarket — would almost certainly be routed to a business-method art unit and buried under §101 rejections in today’s USPTO regardless of what the claims actually recite. Two iconic American commercial innovations might never have benefited from the fuel of interest the patent system was meant to provide.

Deciding who invented something is genuinely hard. History is murky, and the person a story remembers is often not the person on the patent. The foundational Solo Cup patent names an inventor almost nobody has heard of — Clarence Brewer — not the Solo Cup company scion — Robert Hulseman — celebrated in every obituary as the inventor of the “red Solo Cup.” George Mitchell is called the father of fracking, but the man who invented and patented hydraulic fracturing decades earlier was a Stanolind engineer named Riley Floyd Farris. Sometimes the famous name belongs to the businessman rather than the engineer who quietly invented and moved on to solving the next technical problem. Because this list is tied to patents, we went with the inventors named on the patents and tried to note where the patent record and the folklore diverge.

Every list like this reflects choices — including this one. Who gets into a hall of fame, who gets remembered as “the” inventor, which technologies count: those are choices, and there’s no perfect way to make them. I want to be upfront about that. There are millions of US patents and we chose 250. So, I’ve resisted calling these the “greatest” American inventions. It’s a snapshot of the innovation that happened here, told through the patent system that recorded it. And taken together, the stories are also a reminder of what can happen when people have the freedom—and the incentive—to pursue an idea. One pattern was impossible to miss: a remarkable number of the named inventors on this list were immigrants.

Commercial success makes patents targets. Once an invention becomes popular, someone often tries to design around, narrow, invalidate, or otherwise take down the patent protecting it. That’s another clear theme running through the whole list. Alexander Graham Bell’s telephone patents survived roughly 600 lawsuits. Robert Kearns fought Detroit for a decade over the intermittent wiper and won. Others were challenged and weren’t as lucky in the courts. But losing in court does not erase the underlying invention. Those inventors remained on the list even as the legal disputes sometimes made the judgment calls harder.

What struck me most is how little this has changed overall: the independent inventor who has to fight to enforce a patent isn't a modern problem. It's the oldest story in the system — Bell was living it in the 1870s, and many inventors are living it today.

American invention has two prominent faces, and both are on this list. One is the lone inventor — the widow, the machinist, the professor, the founder — with nothing behind them but a patent. The other is the corporate research lab: the same names surface again and again—Bell Labs, IBM, DuPont, 3M, GE—institutions that made invention systematic and gave their researchers the resources to develop, commercialize, and defend their work. The list reflects both traditions, along with many other American companies that built enduring businesses around patented innovation.

A note on method. This is a list of innovations tied to US patents — a deliberate choice. Some great American inventions found other routes to success. And we made no pretense of ranking impact — there's no made-up formula here scoring inventions against each other. Instead, we tried to tell two stories at once: the story of significant American innovation, and the story of how Americans have relied on the patent system to protect it, which is why the list includes inventors like Abraham Lincoln and Howard Lutnick and some personal favorites that have simply made us smile (the wine chiller is staying).

We also folded in the milestone “millionth” patents—1,000,000 through 11,000,000—as snapshots of what America was patenting each time the odometer rolled over. No. 12,000,000 exists, of course. But every list needs an ending, and the age of AI suggested a more fitting one. It took 121 years to reach the first million, in 1911; the most recent million took only about three. The recent milestones are worth a second look because the USPTO now hand-selects which patent receives the round number, making each one a statement by the Office about what counts as “important” innovation.

The list opens with US Patent X1 — a method for making potash, personally signed in 1790 by George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Edmund Randolph — and runs to the transformer architecture that now underpins frontier AI models.

250 years, 250 inventions.

All 250 are in the table below. If you’re reading in email or in Substack app, open the full post in browser for the table. Prefer plain text? See the list in full after the table.

The Clause 8 250: The Full List

The Founding Era (1790–1860)

1790 — Potash making process. Samuel Hopkins. US Patent X1. America’s first patent. It was personally signed by George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Edmund Randolph. Potash was used in fertilizer, soap, and glass and became America’s first industrial export.

1790 — Automated flour mill. Oliver Evans. 3rd US patent (destroyed in the 1836 fire). The world’s first fully automated production line that moved grain through every milling step with almost no human hands, a century before Ford. George Washington licensed it for his Mount Vernon mill. The original patent was one of the patents lost in the 1836 Patent Office fire, and it became among the most litigated of the era (four separate Supreme Court cases).

1793 — Cotton gin. Eli Whitney. US Patent X72. Remade the Southern economy — for better and worse

1809 — Straw-weaving process. Mary Dixon Kies. US Patent 1041X. The first US patent issued to a woman — a technique for weaving straw with silk for hats. The “X” marks it as a pre-1836 patent reconstructed after the Patent Office fire; the original was among those lost.

1821 — Dry scouring (dry cleaning). Thomas Jennings. US Patent 3306X. The first US patent issued to an African American; a prominent abolitionist, he poured his earnings into the anti-slavery movement.

1834 — Mechanical reaper. Cyrus McCormick. US Patent X8277. The horse-drawn reaper that mechanized the grain harvest — one man could now cut in a day what a dozen did with scythes. McCormick’s aggressive licensing and litigation built one of America’s first industrial giants, later folded into International Harvester.

1836 — Locomotive traction wheels. John Ruggles. US Patent 1. Patent No. 1 of the modern series: when the 1836 fire destroyed the old unnumbered records, the Patent Office restarted its count, and Senator John Ruggles — who wrote the reform law that did it — took No. 1, for a cogged wheel to keep locomotives from slipping on steep grades.

1836 — Revolver. Samuel Colt. 138 (later X9430X; reissued as No. 124, 1848).

1838 — Telegraph. Samuel Morse. US Patent 1,647.

1843 — Multiple-effect evaporator (sugar refining). Norbert Rillieux. US Patent 3,237. The basis of all modern industrial evaporation — sugar, condensed milk, soap, glue. Rillieux was a Louisiana Creole and a pioneer of chemical engineering.

1843 — Ice cream freezer. Nancy Johnson. US Patent 3,254. The hand-cranked ice-cream freezer — a paddle churning custard inside a chilled cylinder, essentially the design still sold today.

1844 — Vulcanized rubber. Charles Goodyear. US Patent 3,633. Discovered vulcanization by accident — rubber and sulfur on a hot stove. Spent most of his life on patent-related litigation; Goodyear won in US but lost priority battle to Thomas Hancock in England; Got a rare seven-year extension on US Patent due to inadequate compensation but still died $200,000 in debt.

1846 — Sewing machine. Elias Howe. US Patent 4,750. The first great patent war (”Sewing Machine War”)→ the first patent pool (1856).

1846 — Ether anesthesia (”Letheon”). William Morton. US Patent 4,848. Prospect of enforcement sparked fierce criticism from medical community.

1847 — Rotary printing press. Richard Hoe. US Patent 5,199. Type mounted on a spinning cylinder, printing thousands of sheets an hour, made the mass-circulation daily newspaper possible.

1849 — Safety pin. Walter Hunt. US Patent 6,281. Sold the rights for $400.

1849 — Buoying vessels over shoals. Abraham Lincoln. US Patent 6,469. Only president with a patent.

1851 — Improvements to sewing machine. Isaac Singer. US Patent 8,294. The Sewing Machine War’s other half

1852 — Beehive (movable frame). Lorenzo Langstroth. US Patent 9,300.

1856 — Condensed milk. Gail Borden. US Patent 15,553. Shelf-stable canned milk — Borden vacuum-boiled milk to keep it from spoiling on long journeys, after watching children die from tainted milk on an Atlantic crossing. Nourished Union armies through the Civil War.

1858 — Pencil with eraser. Hymen Lipman. US Patent 19,783. Struck down by the Supreme Court as obvious (Reckendorfer v. Faber, 1875).

1858 — Mason jar. John Landis Mason. US Patent 22,186. Allowed ordinary households to safely preserve food at home. Mason died in poverty.

1859 — Signal flares. Martha Coston. 23,536 / 115,935. A widow who spent a decade perfecting her late husband’s sketch; the Navy bought it. The 1859 patent (23,536) issued under his name with Martha as administratrix; her own improvement patent came in 1871 (115,935).

1860 — Repeating rifle. Benjamin Tyler Henry. US Patent 30,446. The first reliable lever-action repeater revolutionized firearms.

The Machine Age (1861–1900)

1861 — Elevator safety brake. Elisha Otis. US Patent 31,128. A spring-loaded catch that locked the elevator car if the cable snapped. Made elevators survivable and skyscrapers possible.

1861 — Pin-tumbler cylinder lock. Linus Yale Jr.. US Patent 31,278. Small, cheap, pick-resistant mechanism still inside most door keys today.

1862 — Gatling gun. Richard Gatling. US Patent 36,836. The first practical rapid-fire gun — hand-cranked rotating barrels.

1865 — Self-scouring steel plow. John Deere. US Patent 46,454.

1868 — Typewriter (QWERTY). Christopher Latham Sholes. US Patent 79,265. The first commercially successful typewriter; the QWERTY keyboard was arranged to stop the mechanical typebars from jamming.

1869 — Air brake. George Westinghouse. US Patent 88,929. The compressed-air brake that let one engineer stop an entire train at once — before it, brakemen ran car to car turning wheels by hand. It made long, fast, heavy railroads safe.

1869 — Waffle iron. Cornelius Swartwout. US Patent 94,043. A stovetop iron with a handle to flip it without burning your hand.

1870 — Celluloid. John Wesley Hyatt. US Patent 105,338. First commercial plastic

1871 — Cable car. Andrew Hallidie. US Patent 110,971. Grips a continuously moving underground cable to climb hills too steep for horses. Still running in San Francisco.

1871 — Flat-bottom paper bag machine. Margaret Knight. US Patent 116,842. The machine that folds and glues the flat-bottom paper bag, still the basic design today. A man who saw her prototype copied it and filed first; Knight won in an interference proceeding.

1871 — Adjustable garment strap (the “bra clasp”). Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain). US Patent 121,992. Twain created this elastic clasp for vests and pants; the clasp only later migrated to bras (the bra itself wasn’t patented until 1914). Twain later went bankrupt backing others’ inventions and soured on the patent system. Still, in his novel A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, he had the main character declare a country without a patent office “couldn’t travel any way but sideways or backways.”

1872 — Vaseline (petroleum jelly). Robert Chesebrough. US Patent 127,568. Chesebrough sold it door to door by burning his own skin with acid or flame, then healing the wound with his invention.

1872 — Automatic engine lubricator. Elijah McCoy. US Patent 129,843. Imitators were so inferior buyers demanded “the real McCoy.”

1873 — Riveted blue jeans. Jacob Davis & Levi Strauss. US Patent 139,121. Rivets on corners of pockets and base of fly led to jeans’ popularity. Davis was an immigrant tailor who couldn’t afford the filing fee, asked his supplier Strauss to pay to obtain the patent together, and the happily went to work overseeing (what became) Levi’s first manufacturing facility for jeans.

1874 — Barbed wire. Joseph Glidden. US Patent 157,124. Fenced the American West; massive litigation led to Supreme Court eventually upholding the patent in 1874.

1876 — Telephone. Alexander Graham Bell. US Patent 174,465. Bell successfully defended the patent in over 600 court cases.

1876 — Carpet sweeper. Melville Bissell. US Patent 182,346. Swept the floor before the vacuum existed.

1878 — Phonograph. Thomas Edison. US Patent 200,521. Edison called it his favorite invention.

1878 — Cash register. James & John Ritty. US Patent 221,360. Saloonkeeper tired of theft came up with cash register; patented improved version that a paper tape as the recording mechanism and pop-up numbers to indicate sales.

1879 — Incandescent bulb (carbon filament). Thomas Edison. US Patent 223,898. Edison perfected, patented, marketed, and litigated over the incandescent bulb. Lewis Latimer’s longer-lasting carbon filament, patented soon after, helped make it practical.

1879 — The Selden automobile patent. George Selden. US Patent 549,160. The patent attorney who claimed the automobile itself — and collected royalties from nearly every carmaker until Henry Ford refused to pay, fought for eight years, and won. The patent that taught America what designing around means.

1883 — Shoe-lasting machine. Jan Ernst Matzeliger. US Patent 274,207. Surinamese immigrant; cut shoe prices in half.

1884 — Fountain pen. Lewis Waterman. US Patent 293,545. The leak-free pen.

1885 — Folding cabinet bed. Sarah E. Goode. US Patent 322,177. A cabinet that folds into a writing desk, a space-saver for cramped city apartments and a direct ancestor of the Murphy bed. Goode, a Chicago store owner who was likely born enslaved, was among the first Black women to hold a US patent.

1885 — Dishwasher. Josephine Cochrane. US Patent 355,139. The first pressure-jet dishwasher. Cochrane was 45-year old widow in debt when she filed the patent as “J.G. Cochran,” supposedly to hide that she was a woman.

1887 — Automatic elevator doors. Alexander Miles. US Patent 371,207. Riders used to fall down open shafts.

1887 — Gramophone (disc record). Emile Berliner. US Patent 372,786. German immigrant; the format that beat Edison’s cylinder.

1887 — Railway induction telegraphy. Granville Woods. US Patent 373,915. A way for moving trains to send and receive telegraph messages through induction to the rails so dispatchers could locate trains and prevent collisions. Although known as the “Black Edison,” Woods beat Edison himself in both interference fights over this technology.

1888 — Paper drinking straw. Marvin Stone. US Patent 375,962. Replaced the rye-grass straws that made drinks taste like hay.

1888 — AC induction motor. Nikola Tesla. US Patent 381,968. Serbian immigrant.

1888 — Revolving door. Theophilus Van Kannel. US Patent 387,571.

1888 — Kodak roll-film camera. George Eastman. US Patent 388,850.

1889 — Punch-card tabulator. Herman Hollerith. US Patent 395,782. Built for the 1890 Census; laid the foundation for computer programming. Hollerith’s company became IBM.

1891 — Automatic telephone exchange. Almon Strowger. US Patent 447,918. An undertaker who invented dial switching because the town operator — his rival’s wife — was diverting his business calls.

1891 — Carbon black. Edwin Binney & C. Harold Smith. US Patent 453,140. Apparatus for the Manufacture of Carbon-Black” — the pigment behind printing ink, shoe polish, and the black in every car tire.

1892 — Crown bottle cap. William Painter. US Patent 468,258. Mentored King Gillette: “invent something used and thrown away.

1892 — Escalator. Jesse Reno. US Patent 470,918.

1892 — Improved ironing board. Sarah Boone. US Patent 473,653. Born enslaved in North Carolina; her curved, reversible board is the typical modern one.

1893 — Ferris wheel. William Somers. US Patent 489,238. Somers patented the wooden “Roundabout” — the ride George Ferris rode before building his “Ferris Wheel.” Sommers unsuccessfully sued Ferris for infringement.

1893 — Zipper (clasp locker). Whitcomb Judson. US Patent 504,038. It took another twenty years, and Gideon Sundback, to make it practically work.

1894 — Snap mousetrap. William Hooker. US Patent 528,671.

1898 — Radio-controlled boat. Nikola Tesla. US Patent 613,809. The first remote control

1898 — Flashlight. David Misell. US Patent 617,592. Made portable electric light possible. David Misell’s name is on the patent, but the Russian-Jewish immigrant Conrad Hubert (born Akiba Horowitz) is often wrongly identified as the inventor. Hubert was the owner of the Eveready company that Misell worked at.

Electricity, Flight & War (1901–1945)

1903 — Windshield wiper. Mary Anderson. US Patent 743,801. A manufacturer rejected it as having “no commercial value”; the 17-year patent term expired just as wipers became standard equipment. Anderson never made a cent.

1903 — Airplane. Wright Brothers. US Patent 821,393. The patent war → WWI cross-license (proto-patent-pool #2).

1904 — Safety razor with disposable blades. King Gillette. US Patent 775,134.

1906 — Air conditioning. Willis Carrier. US Patent 808,897.

1907 — Track-type tractor (”Caterpillar”). Benjamin Holt. US Patent 874,008. Holt-vs-Best patent wars ended in the 1925 merger that created Caterpillar.

1908 — Triode vacuum tube (Audion). Lee de Forest. US Patent 879,532. Electronic amplifiter that revoluationaized telecommunications and broadcasting.

1908 — Portable electric vacuum. James Spangler. US Patent 889,823. An asthmatic janitor; sold to his cousin’s husband — a man named Hoover.

1909 — Bakelite. Leo Baekeland. US Patent 942,699. First fully synthetic plastic; Belgian immigrant.

1911 — ◆ Patent No. 1,000,000 (vehicle tire). Francis Holton. US Patent 1,000,000. A tubeless, puncture-resistant rubber tire — and it took the country 121 years, from 1790, to reach its first million patents.

1914 — Liquid-propellant rocket. Robert Goddard. US Patent 1,102,653. Multi-stage rocket fueled with a solid “explosive material.” Goddard dies in 1945 but his estate filed suit against US goverment for patent infringement, leading to record $1M settlement after 9 year litigation.

1914 — Toy electric train. Joshua Lionel Cowen. US Patent 1,113,312.

1914 — Safety hood / gas mask. Garrett Morgan. US Patent 1,113,675. Early version of modern gas mask

1914 — Modern bra. Mary Phelps Jacob. US Patent 1,115,674. The first US bra patent.

1915 — Electric self-starter. Charles Kettering. US Patent 1,150,523. Used to start an internal combustion engine. Killed the manual hand crank.

1917 — Zipper (modern). Gideon Sundback. US Patent 1,219,881. The zipper that actually worked — Sundback’s interlocking teeth replaced Judson’s failure-prone hooks and eyes.

1917 — Self-service grocery store. Clarence Saunders. US Patent 1,242,872. A patent on the supermarket itself.

1918 — Gyrocompass. Elmer Sperry. US Patent 1,279,471. Spinning gyroscope that finds true north without magnetism, unaffected by a steel ship’s hull. It made modern naval navigation and autopilot possible.

1920 — Modern parachute. Floyd Smith. US Patent 1,340,423. Freefall parachute with a manual ripcord — letting a jumper fall clear of a disabled aircraft before opening the canopy, rather than having it tethered to the plane. Design made bailing out survivable.

1920 — Superheterodyne radio. Edwin Armstrong. US Patent 1,342,885. His FM patent war with RCA ended in his suicide.

1921 — Pop-up toaster. Charles Strite. US Patent 1,394,450. A timer and spring that eject the toast and cut the heat before it burns.

1923 — 3-position traffic signal. Garrett Morgan. US Patent 1,475,024. Added the ‘caution’ interval between stop and go.

1924 — Popsicle. Frank Epperson. US Patent 1,505,592. Invented at age 11.

1924 — Vitamin D irradiation. Harry Steenbock. US Patent 1,680,818. Led to the birth of university tech transfer. Steenbock found that irradiating food with ultraviolet light filled it with vitamin D — a cure for the rickets then crippling children. Offered $1 million for it by Quaker Oats, he instead put up $300 of his own to found the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation (WARF) in 1925, the first university patent-licensing office. WARF successfully licensed the patent until the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, noting the patent kept vitamin-D foods from the poor, invalidated it in 1945.

1925 — Peanut-derived products. George Washington Carver. US Patent 1,522,176. Not peanut butter, as is often mistaken

1926 — Band-Aid. Earle Dickson. US Patent 1,612,267.

1927 — Hard hat. Edward Bullard. US Patent 1,699,133.

1927 — Electronic television. Philo Farnsworth. US Patent 1,773,980. RCA paid $1 million settlement after initially trying to buy it from Farnsworth for $100,000 in 1931 and decade of litigation

1928 — Permanent wave machine. Marjorie Joyner. US Patent 1,693,515. Machine to set long-lasting waves in hair.

1930 — Flash-frozen food. Clarence Birdseye. US Patent 1,773,079.

1930 — M1 Garand rifle. John C. Garand. US Patent 1,892,141. The rifle that armed every GI in WWII — Patton: “the greatest battle implement ever devised.” He never made a dime; the bill to award him $100K failed in Congress.

1930 — Norden bombsight. Carl Norden & Theodore Barth. US Patent 2,428,678. Gyroscopic precision bombsight configured to drop a bomb in a pickle barrel from 30,000 feet.

1931 — Freon. Thomas Midgley. US Patent 1,833,847. Refrigeration made safe.

1931 — Tampon with applicator. Earle Haas. US Patent 1,926,900.

1931 — Climbing rose. Henry Bosenberg. US Patent PP1. Plant Patent No. 1 following the passage of the 1930 Plant Patent Act.

1932 — Bread-slicing machine. Otto Rohwedder. US Patent 1,867,377.

1932 — Modern uplift bra / cup sizing (Maidenform). William Rosenthal. US Patent 1,979,576. Ida Rosenthal is often credited as the creator of the modern bra but her husband William was named on the key patents. Ida did eventually get a patent of her own, a 1942 adjustable fastener.

1935 — Helicopter (practical). Igor Sikorsky. US Patent 1,994,488. Born in Kyiv; fled the Russian Revolution and landed in New York with $600.

1935 — ◆ Patent No. 2,000,000 (vehicle wheel). Joseph Ledwinka. US Patent 2,000,000. A wheel to make pneumatic tires safer and longer-lasting — the second million took just 24 years, against 121 for the first.

1935 — Monopoly. Charles Darrow. US Patent 2,026,082.

1935 — Kodachrome color film. Leopold Mannes & Leopold Godowsky. US Patent 2,113,329. The first commercially successful modern color film.

1935 — Scotch transparent tape. Richard Drew. US Patent 2,177,627. Drew invented masking tape first, in 1925, for auto painters doing two-tone jobs; the same adhesive-coating know-how led him to this cellophane version. Legend says a frustrated painter told a 3M rep to take his stingy tape back to his “Scotch” bosses, and the name stuck.

1937 — Electric guitar (”Frying Pan”). George Beauchamp. US Patent 2,089,171. Later perfected by Les Paul’s solid body

1938 — Nylon. Wallace Carothers. US Patent 2,130,948. The first fully synthetic fiber, spun from coal, air, and water.

1938 — Fiberglass. Games Slayter, with Thomas & Kleist. US Patent 2,133,236. Mass-producible glass-fiber insulation → Owens Corning.

1939 — Shopping cart. Sylvan Goldman. US Patent 2,155,896.

1940 — Slow cooker (Crock-Pot). Irving Naxon. US Patent 2,187,888. Inspired by his grandmother’s cholent

1941 — Teflon. Roy Plunkett. US Patent 2,230,654. Near-frictionless nonstick coating.

1942 — Frequency-hopping spread spectrum. Hedy Kiesler Markey & George Antheil. US Patent 2,292,387. A radio-guidance system for torpedoes that rapidly hops between frequencies so the signal can’t be jammed — the ancestor of the spread-spectrum techniques in Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and GPS. Markey was the movie star known as “Hedy Lamarr” under her married name; Antheil was a composer. They donated the patent to the war effort but the technology went unused for decades.

1942 — Xerography. Chester Carlson. US Patent 2,297,691.

1942 — Mobile refrigeration. Frederick McKinley Jones. US Patent 2,303,857. Refrigerated trucking, cold chain, wartime blood transport.

1943 — Aerosol spray can. Lyle Goodhue & William Sullivan. US Patent 2,331,117. Pressurized aerosol spray can was first built by the USDA so GIs could blast malaria mosquitoes in the Pacific. It’s now used for hairspray, spray paint, and everything else sprayed out of a can.

1944 — Nuclear reactor. Enrico Fermi & Leó Szilárd. US Patent 2,708,656.

The Postwar Boom & the Chip (1946–1980)

1946 — Pulse-code modulation (digital communication). Bernard Oliver & Claude Shannon. US Patent 2,801,281. How analog reality becomes digital signal — the foundation under digital telephony, the CD, and everything streamed. Filed the same years Shannon coined the “bit.”

1947 — Slinky. Richard James. US Patent 2,415,012.

1947 — <br />General-purpose electronic digital computer (ENIAC)<br />. J. Presper Eckert & John Mauchly. US Patent 3,120,606. Invalidated in Honeywell v. Sperry Rand, 1973.

1948 — Penicillin mass production. Andrew Moyer. 2,442,141 / 2,443,989.

1948 — Streptomycin (first TB antibiotic). Albert Schatz & Selman Waksman. US Patent 2,449,866. Schatz, the grad student, did the bench work isolating it; Waksman took the Nobel and tried to write him out; Schatz sued and won legal recognition as co-discoverer. A third team member, Elizabeth Bugie, got erased almost entirely.

1948 — Transistor. John Bardeen & Walter Brattain. US Patent 2,524,035. The 2,524,035 patent names Bardeen & Brattain; Shockley’s rival junction transistor (2,569,347) is separate — he was furious to be left off, then built the better device.

1949 — Tupperware seal. Earl Tupper. US Patent 2,487,400. Airtight plastic food containers with the ‘burping’ seal — a flop in stores until Brownie Wise invented the home Tupperware party to sell them.

1949 — Hydraulic fracturing (”fracking”). Floyd Farris. US Patent 2,596,843. George Mitchell is popularly called “the father of fracking,” but the actual inventor was Stanolind engineer Floyd Farris, who ran the first “Hydrafrac” experiment in 1947 (gelled gasoline and sand) and patented it.

1950 — Microwave oven. Percy Spencer. US Patent 2,495,429.

1950 — Cruise control. Ralph Teetor. US Patent 2,519,859. Teetor was blind since age five and annoyed by his lawyer’s uneven driving.

1951 — Instant photography. Edwin Land. US Patent 2,543,181. Polaroid v. Kodak, $909M verdict

1951 — Disposable diaper. Marion Donovan. US Patent 2,556,800.

1952 — Barcode. Norman Woodland & Bernard Silver. US Patent 2,612,994.

1952 — LP record (33⅓ microgroove). Peter Goldmark. US Patent 2,950,116. The album as an art form — up to \~23 minutes a side, vinyl instead of shellac, a microgroove a third the old width. Immigrant from Budapest.

1953 — Ice resurfacer. Frank Zamboni. US Patent 2,642,679.

1953 — Airbag. John Hetrick. US Patent 2,649,311. A crash sensor triggering an inflating cushion.

1954 — 6-mercaptopurine / rational drug design. Gertrude Elion & George Hitchings. US Patent 2,697,709. First effective drug against childhood leukemia — and the birth of designing drugs from biochemistry instead of trial-and-error.

1954 — Wiffle ball. William F. Blamey Jr. & David N. Mullany. US Patent 2,776,139.

1954 — Hard disk drive (RAMAC). Louis Stevens, William Goddard & John Lynott. US Patent 3,134,097.

1956 — Wireless TV remote (Space Command). Robert Adler. US Patent 2,817,025. First practical wireless remote — ultrasonic, battery-free, struck aluminum rods like a tiny xylophone.

1957 — Silicon solar cell. Daryl Chapin, Calvin Fuller & Gerald Pearson. US Patent 2,780,765. Turned sunlight into usable electricity, led to solar panels and satellites.

1957 — Super Glue. Harry Coover. US Patent 2,794,788.

1958 — Containerized shipping. Malcom McLean. US Patent 2,853,968. The box that made globalization.

1959 — Precision wire resistor. Otis Boykin. US Patent 2,891,227. Electronic components used in everything from pacemaker control units to guided missiles.

1959 — Barbie. Jack Ryan. US Patent 3,009,284. Public credits Mattel co-founder Ruth Handler, but the utility patent names designer Jack Ryan.

1959 — Integrated circuit. Jack Kilby. US Patent 3,138,743.

1960 — Laser. Arthur Schawlow & Charles Townes. US Patent 2,929,922.

1960 — Bubble wrap. Marc Chavannes. US Patent 3,142,599.

1960 — Computerized Reservation System. Evelyn Berezin. US Patent 3,253,262. First computerized airline-reservation system.

1961 — Planar IC. Robert Noyce. US Patent 2,981,877. The ‘planar’ version of the integrated circuit (IC) that could be mass produced.

1961 — ◆ Patent No. 3,000,000 (automatic reading system). Kenneth Eldredge. US Patent 3,000,000. An early optical character reader that turned printed characters into machine code — a real computing landmark hiding behind a round number.

1962 — Implantable pacemaker. Wilson Greatbatch. US Patent 3,057,356.

1963 — Hula Hoop. Arthur Melin & Richard Knerr. US Patent 3,079,728.

1963 — Tubular steel roller coaster. Karl Bacon & Ed Morgan. US Patent 3,114,332. Basis for every modern steel roller coaster.

1963 — Perceptron (first neural network). Frank Rosenblatt. US Patent 3,287,649. The first machine that could learn — the Navy announced it in 1958 and the NYT called it “the embryo of an electronic computer that will walk, talk, see, write.” Neural nets came back to power everything on the modern AI stack.

1964 — Electret microphone. James West & Gerhard Sessler. US Patent 3,118,022. Used in 90% of the world’s microphones.

1964 — Clean room. Willis Whitfield. US Patent 3,158,457. Every chip and every drug on this list gets made inside this invention.

1964 — Intermittent windshield wiper. Robert Kearns. US Patent 3,351,836.

1965 — Play-Doh. Noah & Joseph McVicker. US Patent 3,167,440.

1966 — Visible LED. Nick Holonyak. US Patent 3,249,473. First visible light-emitting diode (LED); LEDs now light nearly everything.

1966 — Home security system (CCTV). Marie Van Brittan Brown & Albert Brown. US Patent 3,482,037. Ancestor of every video doorbell and smart-home camera.

1967 — AstroTurf. James Faria & Robert Wright. US Patent 3,332,828.

1968 — Valium. Leo Sternbach. US Patent 3,371,085. Polish immigrant.

1968 — DRAM. Robert Dennard. US Patent 3,387,286. Dynamic random-access memory (DRAM) is the primary working memory in most computer systems.

1968 — Microprocessor. Gilbert Hyatt. US Patent 4,942,516. Single integrated-circuit chip for a computer that is at the heart of all modern consumer electronic products.

1969 — Balloon embolectomy catheter. Thomas Fogarty. US Patent 3,435,826. Surgical device used to rapidly remove blood clots.

1969 — Moog synthesizer. Robert Moog. US Patent 3,475,623.

1969 — Residential smoke detector. Lyman Blackwell. US Patent 3,735,375.

1969 — Charge-coupled device (CCD). Willard Boyle & George Smith. US Patent 3,858,232. Core image snsor in digital cameras, etelescopes, sensors, etc.

1970 — Computer mouse. Douglas Engelbart. US Patent 3,541,541. Patent expired before the mouse mattered; SRI licensed to Apple for a pittance.

1971 — Scotchgard stain repellent. Patsy Sherman & Samuel Smith. US Patent 3,574,791.

1971 — String trimmer (Weed Eater). Melvin Geist & George Ballas. US Patent 3,708,967.

1971 — Networked ATM. Don Wetzel et al.. US Patent 3,761,682.

1972 — Wheeled luggage. Bernard Sadow. US Patent 3,653,474.

1972 — Kevlar. Stephanie Kwolek. US Patent 3,671,542. Aramid fiber five times stronger than steel by weight, commonly used for bulletproof vests.

1972 — Modern athletic shoe (waffle sole). Bill Bowerman. US Patent 3,793,750.

1973 — Low-loss optical fiber. Robert Maurer, Donald Keck & Peter Schultz. US Patent 3,711,262. The first optical fiber pure enough to carry light for miles with little loss — made fiber-optic communication, and the modern internet’s backbone, possible.

1973 — Home video game console. Ralph Baer. US Patent 3,728,480. German refugee; beat Atari in court.

1974 — GPS. Roger Easton. US Patent 3,789,409.

1974 — MRI. Raymond Damadian. US Patent 3,789,832.

1974 — Taser. Jack Cover. US Patent 3,803,463.

1974 — Solo cup (”Thin Walled Cup”). Clarence T. Brewer. US Patent 3,951,266. Every obituary credits Robert Leo Hulsema but the patent names Clarence T. Brewer as the inventor of the technology that made the solo cup possible.

1975 — Wearable insulin pump. Dean Kamen. US Patent 3,858,581. The first wearable infusion pump so patients could dose medication continuously instead of by injection.

1975 — Laser printer. Gary Starkweather. US Patent 3,867,571.

1975 — Handheld cell phone. Martin Cooper. US Patent 3,906,166. First call: his rival at Bell Labs

1976 — Implantable defibrillator. Michel Mirowski, Morton Mower, Alois Langer & Stephen Heilman. US Patent 3,942,536. The implantable defibrillator — a device that lives in the chest, watches for a fatal arrhythmia, and shocks the heart back into rhythm. Colleagues called it impossible; Mirowski, who had watched a friend die of sudden cardiac death, built it anyway.

1976 — Gore-Tex. Bob Gore. US Patent 3,953,566. The waterproof-but-breathable membrane used for rain gear.

1976 — ◆ Patent No. 4,000,000 (asphalt recycling). Robert Mendenhall. US Patent 4,000,000. A process for recycling old road surfaces into new asphalt — issued the year of the Bicentennial.

1976 — Video game cartridge. Ronald A. Smith & Nicholas Talesfore. US Patent 4,095,791.

1977 — EpiPen. Sheldon Kaplan. US Patent 4,031,893. A spring-loaded device that drives a precise dose in seconds for emergency treatment of life-threatening allergic reactions.

1977 — Ethernet. Robert Metcalfe. US Patent 4,063,220. The standard that lets many computers share one wire without their signals colliding into noise. It still connects most of the wired world.

1978 — Digital camera. Steven Sasson. US Patent 4,131,919.

1979 — Personal computer (Apple II). Steve Wozniak. US Patent 4,136,359. The personal computer-with-video-display patent.

1979 — Artificial heart (Jarvik-7). Robert Jarvik. US Patent 4,173,796. The first permanent artificial heart — Barney Clark lived 112 days on it in 1982. Basis for continuing work in field.

1979 — Sports bra. Lisa Lindahl, Hinda Miller & Polly Smith. US Patent 4,174,717.

1980 — Statins (lovastatin). Richard Monaghan, Alfred Alberts & Carl Hoffman. US Patent 4,231,938. A cholesterol-blocking compound isolated from a fungus, and the start of the best-selling class of drugs in history.

1980 — Recombinant DNA. Stanley Cohen & Herbert Boyer. US Patent 4,237,224. Method for splicing genes into bacteria so they manufacture proteins on demand. Foundational patent for genetic-engineering.

The Digital Turn (1981–2000)

1981 — Oil-eating bacterium. Ananda Chakrabarty. US Patent 4,259,444. Specialized microorganisms that use enzymes to break down petroleum hydrocarbons into carbon dioxide and water. Diamond v. Chakrabarty (Supreme Court held invention was patent eligible under §101 in 5–4 decision.

1981 — Li-ion cathode (lithium cobalt oxide). John Goodenough & Koichi Mizushima. US Patent 4,302,518. The cathode chemistry behind every lithium-ion battery.

1982 — Prozac. Bryan Molloy & Klaus Schmiegel. US Patent 4,314,081. The first SSRI antidepressant. By adjusting serotonin rather than blunting the whole nervous system, it reshaped how the world treats depression.

1982 — Machine vision / automated identification. Jerome Lemelson. US Patent 4,338,626.

1983 — Controlled drug delivery. Robert Langer. US Patent 4,391,797.

1983 — Public-key cryptography (RSA). Ron Rivest, Adi Shamir & Leonard Adleman. US Patent 4,405,829. Public-key cryptography allows strangers to exchange secrets over an open line, and the reason online banking and e-commerce can work today. The three MIT inventors’ initials name it: RSA.

1983 — Super Soaker. Lonnie Johnson. US Patent 4,591,071.

1984 — Thermal inkjet. John Vaught & HP team. US Patent 4,490,728. The mechanism in every HP inkjet printer.

1986 — 3D printing. Chuck Hull. US Patent 4,575,330.

1986 — Nicotine patch. Frank Etscorn. US Patent 4,597,961.

1987 — PCR. Kary Mullis. US Patent 4,683,202. The polymerase chain reaction (PCR) is a way to copy a single strand of DNA into billions, the technique behind DNA fingerprinting, genetic testing, and modern biology.

1988 — Palmaz coronary stent. Julio Palmaz. US Patent 4,733,665.

1988 — OncoMouse. Philip Leder & Timothy Stewart. US Patent 4,736,866. Genetically modified laboratory mouse engineered to facilitate cancer research.

1988 — Laserphaco cataract surgery. Patricia Bath. US Patent 4,744,360.

1988 — Spinal fusion devices. Gary Michelson. US Patent 5,015,247. First threaded spinal-fusion implant. Patent portfolio sold to Medtronic for $1.35 billion — likely the biggest individual-inventor sale in history.

1989 — LASIK. Gholam Peyman. US Patent 4,840,175. Iranian immigrant

1989 — Interactive voice response (”press 1 for...”). Ronald A. Katz. US Patent 4,845,739.

1990 — CDMA cellular technology. Klein Gilhousen, Irwin Jacobs, Lindsay Weaver & Charles Wheatley. US Patent 4,901,307. The foundation for modern cellular communication standards.

1991 — ◆ Patent No. 5,000,000 (ethanol from microbes). Lonnie Ingram, Tyrrell Conway & Flavio Alterthum. US Patent 5,000,000. A method using E. coli to make fuel ethanol, from the University of Florida.

1993 — “Hub and spoke” financial method. R. Todd Boes. US Patent 5,193,056. A data-processing system for pooling mutual funds in a “hub and spoke” structure to cut costs and win tax advantages. In State Street Bank v. Signature Financial (1998) the Federal Circuit famously upheld it and swept away the old “business method exception.

1993 — Post-it Notes. Art Fry. US Patent 5,194,299.

1995 — CMOS active pixel sensor (camera-on-a-chip). Eric Fossum. US Patent 5,471,515. The sensor in every phone camera.

1996 — Lyrica (pregabalin). Richard Silverman. US Patent 5,563,175. Compound that became the blockbuster nerve-pain and seizure drug Lyrica.

1996 — Online maps & directions. Elon Musk & Maurice Fitzgerald. US Patent 5,944,769. Interactive business directory service with integrated maps and directions.”

1998 — Google PageRank. Larry Page. US Patent 6,285,999.

1999 — Amazon 1-Click. Peri Hartman, Jeff Bezos, Shel Kaphan & Joel Spiegel. US Patent 5,960,411.

1999 — ◆ Patent No. 6,000,000 (file syncing). Jeffrey Hawkins & Michael Albanese. US Patent 6,000,000. A snapshot of 1999: one-button syncing of files between a PC and a handheld, invented at Palm, maker of the PalmPilot.

2000 — Content delivery network (CDN). Tom Leighton & Daniel Lewin. US Patent 6,108,703. Accelerates internet content delivery by caching assets—like HTML, images, and videos—closer to users Lewin was killed aboard AA Flight 11 on 9/11 — likely the attack’s first victim.

2000 — Virtual yellow first-down line. Stan Honey. US Patent 6,141,060. “Method and apparatus for adding a graphic indication of a first down to a live video of a football game”

The Connected Century (2001–2019)

2001 — Spanx. Sara Blakely. US Patent 6,276,176. The footless, seamless shaping garment. The patent made Blakely the youngest self-made woman billionaire.

2003 — Electronic Treasury trading. Howard Lutnick et al.. US Patent 6,560,580. Lutnick is among the most prolific US inventors ever (400+ patents) and is now the Commerce Secretary overseeing the USPTO. The ‘580 was held unenforceable in eSpeed v. BrokerTec (Fed. Cir. 2007) but his innovations regarding electronic Treasury trading still remade the market.

2003 — DVD-by-mail method. Reed Hastings, Marc Randolph & Neil Hunt. US Patent 6,584,450. Netflix’s foundational patent, enforced it against Blockbuster in 2006.

2005 — Roomba. Joseph L. Jones, Newton E. Mack, David M. Nugent & Paul E. Sandin. US Patent 6,883,201.

2005 — Bionic Wrench. Dan Brown. US Patent 6,889,579.

2006 — ◆ Patent No. 7,000,000 (biodegradable fiber). John O’Brien. US Patent 7,000,000. A biodegradable polysaccharide fiber for low-cost textiles, from DuPont.

2006 — mRNA modification. Katalin Karikó & Drew Weissman. US Patent 8,278,036.

2007 — Ridesharing (shared-transport matching). Sean O’Sullivan. US Patent 7,840,427.

2007 — Tweeting. Jack Dorsey & Biz Stone. US Patent 8,401,009.

2009 — VoIP. Marian Croak. US Patent 7,599,359. Voice over Internet Protocol — not Voice of IP.

2009 — Slide to unlock. Imran Chaudhri, Bas Ording & others. US Patent 8,046,721. The patent on sliding your thumb to unlock a phone — one of the arsenal of iPhone-interface patents (alongside multi-touch, US 7,479,949, “the Steve Jobs patent”) Apple wielded in the smartphone wars.

2011 — ◆ Patent No. 8,000,000 (visual prosthesis). Robert Greenberg, Kelly McClure & Arup Roy. US Patent 8,000,000. An implant that delivers neural stimulation to create artificial vision for the blind (Second Sight).

2012 — Kiva warehouse robots. Mick Mountz, Raffaello D’Andrea & Peter Wurman. US Patent 8,280,547. The robots inside every Amazon fulfillment center.

2013 — Square card reader. Jim McKelvey (Square, with Dorsey). US Patent 8,534,546.

2013 — reCAPTCHA. Luis von Ahn. US Patent 8,555,353.

2013 — Flippy tablet stand. Bruce Cannon & Juliette Fassett. RE48,479.

2014 — CRISPR gene editing. Feng Zhang. US Patent 8,697,359.

2014 — Ephemeral messaging (Snapchat). Evan Spiegel & Robert Murphy. US Patent 9,537,811.

2015 — ◆ Patent No. 9,000,000 (windshield washer). Matthew Carroll. US Patent 9,000,000. A system that collects rainwater to refill your windshield-washer reservoir.

2015 — Bunch O Balloons. Josh Malone. US Patent 9,051,066. Product to fill up and self-tie 100+ water balloons in 60 seconds. Clause 8 guest, Ep. 16.

2017 — Structure-based vaccine design. Barney Graham & Jason McLellan. 9,738,689 / 10,960,070. The stabilized spike inside COVID vaccines.

2017 — Vinglace wine chiller. Colton Haas. US Patent 9,988,202. Editor’s indulgence. A vacuum-insulated, glass-lined bottle holder that keeps wine cold without ice — proof the patent system still turns up for a well-made everyday object.

2018 — ◆ Patent No. 10,000,000 (coherent LiDAR). Joseph Marron. US Patent 10,000,000. Laser detection and ranging (LiDAR), from Raytheon — and the USPTO now curates these milestones: a GE scientist openly timed two filings hoping to land this number.

2019 — ◆ Patent No. 11,000,000 (heart-valve stent). Saravana Kumar & Jason Diedering. US Patent 11,000,000. A collapsible stent frame for a heart valve, built by a Minnesota startup that began in a garage. Filed 2019, granted 2021 — the last million took about three years.

2019 — Transformer architecture. Ashish Vaswani et al.. US Patent 10,452,978.

Disclaimer

Instead, it’s one of the episodes that I’ve thought back to the most. Not because of the PAP mechanics — many of which have already shifted — but because Jerry, in passing, kept handing out the kind of advice that holds up no matter who’s running examination or which policy is in effect.

A quick update before the advice: since we recorded, Jerry was named Acting Chief Communications Officer. I’m not going to claim that his star performance on Clause 8 is what landed him the role, but he wouldn’t be the first to be named to a top USPTO role not long after first appearing on the show.

The other update is less of a joke. The streamlined review — the new requirement that supervisors sign off on first office actions from primaries and PSAs, which Jerry defended at length on the episode — has since been scaled back and then suspended outright by Director Squires after SPEs pushed back.

Listening back to the episode, that’s in line with the process Jerry described. He told me the office was “baselining it this first quarter,” that “we collect a lot of data and we watch,” and that they’d adjust based on feedback from examiners, SPEs, and practitioners. It seems the program didn’t survive that feedback loop. But the approach he described outlived the policy. So did the advice.

Advice for practitioners

Jerry’s clearest message: pick up the phone. Even after final. The worry going around - that the new interview limits mean examiners will start automatically denying subsequent interviews during the same round of prosecution - is, in his telling, an “incorrect assumption.” An examiner who refuses after-final interviews as a matter of personal policy is “inappropriate,” and arbitrarily denying interviews now counts against an examiner’s rating under the stakeholder-interaction element.

But Jerry also stressed: the interview is only as good as your agenda. Jerry came back to this more than once: the agenda should discuss the claims, the prior art, the direction you want to go, and any amendments you’re weighing. And, after final, practitioners should expect to send it before the interview gets scheduled. It’s the thing that lets an examiner walk to their SPE and say, I’ve got a real agenda, this will move the case, authorize the time. A vague “can we talk?” gives the supervisor nothing to approve. A tight agenda gives them every reason to.

And the line I keep repeating to younger associates is Jerry’s framing of the statute: a person is entitled to a patent unless. “Close calls should go to applicants.” When an examiner is hunting for something to reject on an otherwise allowable case, in Jerry’s words, they’re “looking for something that shouldn’t exist in the first place.”

Other advice to practitioners regarding interviews:

• Use the AIR form. File your interview request through the applicant-initiated interview request (AIR) form so the examiner can’t miss it.

• Make the second interview easy to approve. Your one automatic interview per round is the limit now; the next one needs SPE sign-off, so hand the examiner a real agenda and a clear sense of what it’ll resolve.

• Don’t bank interviews. In Jerry’s view they work like feedback — most useful when they’re timely and specific, not saved for a rainy day.

• Skip the fishing expedition. The MPEP discourages sounding-out interviews with no agenda, and Jerry says good attorneys rarely bother with them anymore.

Advice for examiners who feel stuck with their SPE

Jerry became a supervisor during the first year of the old “second pair of eyes” program — walking into a new art unit full of examiners with decades more experience examining the technology.

His advice to examiners who feel like nothing they do satisfies their SPE: it doesn’t have to be that way, and you don’t have to absorb it. “People don’t leave a job, they tend to leave a boss.” If the relationship is genuinely broken, go to your group director — examiners ask for and get transfers, and Jerry approved plenty when he was a group director himself. The SPE is meant to be a coach, not a gatekeeper.

He was also blunt about the specific thing examiners and practitioners both complain about — the supervisor who hands work back with some version of “go find something to reject.” Jerry doesn’t defend it. “I don’t feel it, keep looking” is, in his view, not how it’s supposed to work. The supervisor’s job is to tell the examiner what to look for and where, or to point to the art — not to outsource a gut feeling and call it review.

Other advice to examiners:

• Journal your cases. Log the serial number and timestamp each phase — reading, understanding the claims, planning the search, searching, drafting. After six or seven, your time-suck shows itself. Jerry’s was searching.

• Search smarter, not longer. If search is where your time goes, ask colleagues who know the technology how they’d approach it, instead of searching exhaustively out of a sense of completeness.

• Don’t ration interviews. Refusing after-final interviews as a personal policy is improper, and so is telling attorneys to “keep their powder dry” — arbitrary denials hit your stakeholder-interaction rating.

• Just ask for the time. When you want a second interview or after-final time, send your SPE the agenda and ask — they should generally say yes.

• Be the one people ask for help. Become the best examiner at your grade and in your technology, the one other examiners and SPEs are told to go ask.

• Take the leap before you feel ready. When something opens up that you don’t feel quite qualified for, that’s usually the signal to take it. “We’re always our worst critics.”

• Watch for the off-ramps. The office opens up other paths — law school (it paid for Jerry’s), a master’s, management, petitions, or training new examiners at the academy.

Advice to SPEs

Jerry’s whole pitch for the streamlined review — now suspended, but worth hearing anyway — was that it should be “a point of collaboration and feedback, not a gotcha.” The most senior examiners, he kept emphasizing, are hyper-technical experts who often forget to explain what is plainly obvious to them. Sometimes the value a supervisor adds is catching the one extra sentence that would let the attorney follow the logic from A to B to C without having to guess at it.

His model for how a supervisor should handle an examiner who knows the art better than they do came from his own first year: I’ll make the evaluations, but if I see something, I’ll come to you and ask what you think, and we’ll talk it through. The technical expertise flows up from the examiner; the supervisor carries the burden to learn it. The old-school version — and he told this one with obvious affection — was his own first supervisor walking him to the search room, the physical “shoes,” pulling open a drawer, flipping to the reference, and saying, “here’s your 102.” That’s guidance. “Keep looking” is not.

Other advice to SPEs:

• Default to yes. On requests for second interviews and extra non-production time, Jerry’s posture for supervisors is that they “should be saying yes.”

• Review allowances and rejections the same way. Keep it agnostic — judge whether the patentability call was right, and don’t go harder on the allowances.

• You have discretion on errors, so use it. Whether a clear error counts against an examiner’s rating is your call, and these are your most senior people, so be thoughtful rather than a gotcha.

• Coach the typos. A “claims 1 through 100” slip on a ten-claim application is a coaching moment, not an error to log.

• There’s no error quota. Nobody expects you to hand out a set number of clear errors.

• Pay for the genuine outliers. Grant non-production time for the real one-offs — a monstrous IDS, a 75-claim set, a PPH case that needs more time.

The part that has nothing to do with the PAP

What ties all of it together is a phrase Jerry used several times: be reasonable, do the right thing, and don’t be a jerk about it. You won’t find it in the PAP but the USPTO (and its battle with the backlog) would improve immensely if everyone — examiners, supervisors, and the practitioners on the other side — consistently operated that way.

The other thing that’s stayed with me is how Jerry talks about the job itself. At the macro level he’s careful never to lose the person inside the data: “behind every number is a person, behind every application number is an inventor.” And when I asked him for career advice for new examiners, he reached, unprompted, for Newton — if I’ve seen farther, it’s because I’ve stood on the shoulders of giants. He’ll never be the inventor on the shoulders, he said. He’s the one who helps build the ladder.

Then he mentioned that his job is written into the Constitution, and that Thomas Jefferson was his first colleague at the office. For a show named after Article I, Section 8, Clause 8, I couldn’t have scripted it better.

Congratulations on the new role, Jerry.

🎧 Watch the full episode here or list in your favorite podcasting app, and find additional bonus content on the new Clause 8 YouTube channel.

Disclaimer

This is the last episode of this season of Clause 8, and we recently crossed the 100-episode mark. When I started the show, I didn’t have a number like that in mind; I just wanted to talk to the people actually shaping the patent system.

I’ll save the proper thank-yous for the bottom. For now: it felt right to close the season with Kevin Mack, the new president of Via Licensing Alliance, for a conversation about where patent licensing is going in the age of AI — and why he’s optimistic about the future.

On this episode…

Modern patent pools have almost always formed around a formal standard, set by a standard-setting organization, with FRAND commitments attached.

But, on this episode, Mack describes a broader future for collaborative licensing. Via isn’t only looking at “black and white standards,” as he put it, but also at technologies that function like standards in the market even if no standards body ever formally declared them to be one.

Picture AI: if enough companies converge on the same techniques for the same reasons — the way they would around a formal standard, only without anyone declaring one — that technology starts to function like a standard, too. The difference is the patents around it are scattered and unresolved, with no clean map of who holds what. Mack's plan is to do for that what Via already does for formal standards — pull the relevant patents into a pool so the technology can be licensed in one efficient place, instead of fought over one dispute at a time.

Mack has worked the patent system from most sides — he prosecuted patents, litigated them at Skadden, and spent years at Dolby running compliance and sitting in the standardization rooms — and he now runs the administrator that the 2023 merger of Via Licensing and MPEG LA made the largest in consumer electronics. Dolby keeps turning up in Via's orbit — his predecessor, Heath Hoglund, came from there too and Kevin talks about the connection. He inherits an organization in motion. Hoglund and the previous chief licensing officer, Jane Bu, have joined other pool administrators. Via handed its HEVC pool to Access Advance, which Mack frames as the right call for an ecosystem where pool fragmentation helps no one. It's pushing into semiconductors, with a new pool announced in the fall and a DRAM memory program he says is close to launch. And he's stood up a strategy-and-growth group — presumably where the de facto-standards thinking is coming from.

His call for pools comes as some implementers seem to be searching for alternatives. AV1, the royalty-free video codec from the big tech–backed Alliance for Open Media, and — newer — SAIL, the Shared AI License Foundation, a royalty-free patent commons for “AI foundational models” launched this spring to at least create the appearance of taking patents off the table entirely.

Mack offers support for some of these initiatives but is candid that trying to create "a brand new technology that's competitive with the current marketplace without stepping on someone else's technology" can be "a little bit naive."

What keeps him optimistic is the policy weather: coming out of Via's recent summit in Rome, he reads the US posture as friendlier to patent owners than it's been in years — officials openly weighing injunctions for SEP holders, questioning whether an SEP automatically confers market power, treating rate fights as ordinary negotiations rather than antitrust problems. In his telling, the wind is finally at the patent owners' back — and that naturally creates a bigger need for licensing administrators like Via.

The episode covers:

• How Via’s model actually works — and the “tipping point” that turns a pool from a handful of licensors into thousands of licensees

• The leadership turnover, the HEVC pool’s move to Access Advance, and Via’s strategy-and-growth group

• Via’s push into semiconductors, including a new DRAM memory program

• “De facto” standards — why Via’s next pools may form around technology no standards body ever blessed

• AV1 and the royalty-free question, and why Mack thinks royalty-free rarely stays free

• SAIL, and whether AI patents are as “foundational” as advertised

• Efficient infringement, patents as property rights, and why so many companies ultimately take a license

• The mood out of Via’s summit in Rome — and a US patent system Mack sees tilting back toward patent owners

Eli again…thank you, thank you, thank you!

To everyone who made Clause 8 part of how they keep up with IP: thank you. That’s not a small thing, and I don’t take it for granted.

This was the season Clause 8 went all-in on video — a real in-person studio, in-person video recordings, and the official launch of the Clause 8 YouTube channel. AA few episodes found real audiences there faster than I'd expected. My producer Dustin and his PodTechs team made that leap possible and defined the future for the show.

There was also some nice outside recognition. Law360 recently put Clause 8 first in its roundup, 5 Podcasts to Keep IP Attys Entertained and Informed. (Feedspot has put Clause 8 again at the top of its IP podcast list.)

And a huge thank you to Tradespace for its generous support over the last two seasons. I had a lot of fun working together and helping them grow during a particularly eventful time for the market.

Next season, I’m looking forward to working with a wider set of sponsors to tell the story of what the AI boom will mean for the IP field.

Most of all, none of this would have been possible without YOU - the listeners (and viewers!). As I’ve said before, the podcast only exists because enough of you care about IP to listen (or watch!) in your free time. I’m beyond grateful for that.

And an extra thank you to everyone who helped share Clause 8 with others. Because of you, the show is still growing — and I’m excited to bring you more in future seasons.

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Disclaimer

When Bruce Lehman announced that he would step down as head of the USPTO in 1998, Teresa Riordan devoted her regular “Patents” column in The New York Times to Lehman’s time at the USPTO and observed that “defenders and detractors tend to agree on one point: That Mr. Lehman has raised the visibility of intellectual property by transforming what was formerly a bench-warming position into a prominent perch.” The Times has not covered another USPTO head’s departure in the same way since.1 And the Times stopped running the “Patents” column altogether in the early 2000s.2

It turned out that Lehman’s prominent tenure was more of an exception likely because of who he was rather than any lasting transformation of the role - and coincided with a high point of America’s modern appreciation for IP. Lehman, now happily retired in Florida, sat down with Eli Mazour at his home to record this special Clause 8 episode. Lehman shares his candid perspective on the role he played in the major IP developments of the modern era, his time as head of the USPTO during the dot-com boom, and what has followed, including the lessons he draws from dealing with the rise of the internet for today’s AI moment.

On the USPTO’s gallery of past leaders, Lehman’s is the first portrait in color — a small marker of where he sits in the agency’s history.

“I am a card-carrying member of the Deep State.”

Lehman was not a member of the patent bar — or, as he affectionately joked after the recording, a member of “the priesthood” — but was a man of Washington and deeply cared about IP issues when he was nominated by President Bill Clinton in 1993 to helm the USPTO. By that point, he had spent close to two decades focused on IP issues on Capitol Hill, starting as counsel to his home-state Wisconsin Rep. Bob Kastenmeier on the House Judiciary Committee, where he worked on major copyright legislation (including the 1976 Copyright Act), patent policy (including the Bayh-Dole Act), and supporting the broader government architecture that helped connect IP to American competitiveness.

During the episode, Lehman proudly says he was “a card-carrying member of the Deep State” and “a member of the club.” That mattered.

To the surprise of many, but not Lehman himself, he was unanimously confirmed by the Senate as the first openly gay man ever confirmed by that body — something he describes as “probably the most historic thing I’ve ever done.” He tells the story of Sen. Strom Thurmond wanting to personally explain why he was supporting him, and walking into the room behind the Senate Judiciary Committee chamber where he knew almost everyone there.

Those deep Washington relationships also explain why he was able to have a uniquely expansive impact on IP policy once he was confirmed as head of the USPTO, including on copyright even though that falls outside the official purview of the USPTO.

From inside the USPTO during the internet boom, he helped steer the WIPO Copyright Treaties — the foundation for what became the DMCA — and the TRIPS-era push that put IP at the center of Clinton's economic agenda.

New Copyright Legislation in the Age of AI?

Lehman delivered the legislative response to the internet boom. Asked whether the AI boom requires another, he doesn't hesitate.

That history makes Lehman’s critique of today’s environment more striking: the country that once pushed the world toward stronger IP protection is now often debating how far to weaken it.

Lehman sees this through what he calls the “patent pendulum” — the idea that US IP policy historically moves through cycles of strong and weak protection. In his telling, strong IP rights help create new industries. Those industries become dominant. Then the companies with market power often lose interest in strong IP rights because they no longer need them.

That, he argues, is where we are now. Lehman argues that courts have spent the last two decades weakening copyright through an expansive view of fair use. The result, in his view, is that AI companies are now using massive amounts of human-created content to train models without giving creators a meaningful stake.

He calls that “fundamentally immoral.”

So when asked whether new legislation is needed to protect creators in the AI age, Lehman did not hedge.

“The short answer is yes.”

Whether Congress in 2026 can pull off what it did in the 1990s is its own question. But the DMCA’s architect has a unique vantage point to argue that it should try.

The episode covers:

• The DMCA before it was the DMCA — how the Clinton administration’s internet copyright work became the foundation for the 1996 WIPO Copyright Treaties and later US legislation.

• TRIPS, WIPO, and the globalization of IP — how the US helped strengthen IP rights around the world in the 1990s, and why that history contrasts so sharply with today’s debates over patents, fair use, AI, and access to technology.

• Why Lehman thinks AI requires new copyright legislation — and why he believes courts have taken fair use too far.

• Limits of AI — why Lehman believes AI can process vast databases but lacks the “metaphysical” spark behind true invention.

• The “patent pendulum” — Lehman’s framework for understanding US IP policy as a cycle between strong-protection and weak-protection eras.

• Bayh-Dole and the rise of the university-to-startup pipeline — including why Lehman sees the statute as central to the development of modern Silicon Valley.

• Historic confirmation as the first openly gay man confirmed by the US Senate.

• How he turned the USPTO into a “prominent perch” for national IP policy, even though copyright formally sits outside the agency.

• Gilbert Hyatt, submarine patents, and SAWS — including Lehman’s view that Hyatt was “abused and mistreated.”

• USPTO’s telework & modernization for internet age — how the agency became an early large-scale telework test case and why Lehman thinks it transformed examiner retention and efficiency.

• His unvarnished take on today’s USPTO, including his message to leadership on how to treat the patent examiner corps.

• Judge Pauline Newman, who Lehman describes as a friend, a “sweetheart,” and “a thorn to a lot of her colleagues” because of her pro-patent views.

🎧 Watch the full episode above or listen on your favorite podcast app—and subscribe to the Clause 8 YouTube channel for bonus content.

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Disclaimer

The hope, widely held, was that this would get sorted out soon. The USPTO would provide clear guidance about how to avoid and overcome Section 101 rejections like they had in the past. The Federal Circuit would draw cleaner lines. Congress would step in.

The working theory was that, once that happened, you’d be able to get applications through the USPTO just by adding some magic language to claims and the specification. In anticipation of that, some practitioners even advised clients to file appeals within the USPTO to buy a year or two of time until that happened.

Ngai Zhang and I were separately coming to a very different conclusion: there had to be a new, better way to reliably obtain strong patents in this space.

That’s how I first met Ngai.

He reached out after he came across an early article I’d written about the impact of Alice and wanted to compare notes. Around the same time, Ngai had argued an oral hearing at the USPTO and walked out with a lesson that has guided his work ever since: examiners and judges form a snap judgment about what a patent application is really about. If that judgment is “business innovation,” you’ve already lost. The technical story has to be the first impression.

I was coincidentally coming up with and writing about strategies for doing that.

Over time, it became clear that the hoped-for reset never came. Many applicants and practitioners continued to draft and file patent applications focused on business use cases, with some technical language added at the beginning or the end. Those applications often landed in business method art units, ran into repeated Section 101 rejections, and had to be abandoned. And even when some were allowed, they were often not the kinds of patents you would want to depend on in litigation.

The problem also did not stay confined to business method inventions, which became especially important as AI-related inventions took off. Although the USPTO’s 2019 guidance significantly improved at least how Section 101 was applied at the agency, later shifts at the USPTO limited that reprieve. As I’ve written before, Section 101 rejection rates soared in AI-related art units, raising many of the same issues we had been dealing with in the business method context.

It wasn’t long before Ngai and I realized our approach — rethinking things from the ground up rather than just following what other practitioners had done in the past — extended well beyond Section 101. We started exchanging strategies on every part of the practice: examiner interviews, unconventional amendment strategies, claim drafting, and how to draft for both prosecution and litigation.

Eventually, I joined Ngai at Foley & Lardner so that we could implement these strategies together. We’ve kept having these conversations, and finally decided to record this episode to share that story - and the strategies - more broadly.

But this is not just a look back at how Alice forced us to rethink patent prosecution.

It is also a conversation about what comes next.

The same team that was built around solving hard Section 101 problems for business method inventions is now focused heavily on AI — both as a patenting challenge and as a tool that may reshape patent practice itself.

We talk about tools for AI-assisted drafting and prosecution, patent quality, and why judgment, communication, and human interaction may matter even more as the tools get better.

On this episode, Ngai and I also discuss:

• Why relying only on art unit prediction tools & wordsmithing is a losing strategy for § 101

• Why claim 1 shouldn’t be your broadest claim

• How taking features out of independent claims can help advance prosecution - and how the strategy also leaves clients pleasantly surprised by the breadth of the allowed claims

• Examiner interviews as hostage negotiations: Ngai’s framework based on Chris Voss’s Never Split the Difference

• Where and why Ngai and I differ on whether to push for an explicit on-the-record agreement before ending an examiner interview

• AI as a collaborator for patent drafting and prosecution

• What AI changes — and does not change — about the role of patent lawyers

• The importance of human interactions and communication for patent prosecution even in the age of AI

  Voice of IP has more — new Clause 8 episodes, original reporting, and the occasional take on what's happening at the USPTO. Free to subscribe.

🎧 Watch the full episode above or listen on your favorite podcast app—and subscribe to the Clause 8 YouTube channel for bonus content.

📌 Presented by Tradespace — where ideas take flight.

Disclaimer

This is the Clause 8 Eight: Government Officials Edition. Countdown from eight to one.

The Clause 8 Eight is a new Voice of IP feature. Disagree with the ranking? Think someone’s missing? Have ideas for future installments? Send them our way: eli@VoiceOfIP.com.

#8 Darrell Issa Chair, House Subcommittee on Courts, IP, AI, and the Internet

For years after the America Invents Act (AIA) passed, Congressman Issa carried the congressional baton on what he characterized as the continuing “patent troll” problem, pushing legislation in that direction that largely went nowhere. As the current USPTO has moved in a more pro-patent direction, his influence in shaping the agency’s trajectory has waned, and his recent hearing meant to raise alarm about the USPTO’s changes with regards to post-grant proceedings at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) largely fell flat. But as chair of the House’s IP Subcommittee, Issa remains a gatekeeper for any patent legislation hoping to move through the House. Whether he finds common ground with the Senate to make a lasting legislative impact before the end of his time in Congress remains the open question.

🎙️ Related: Issa’s Chief IP Counsel John Lee

#7 Dina Kallay Deputy Assistant Attorney General, DOJ Antitrust Division

Kallay has emerged as one of the most vocal voices within the current administration on the importance of patents in securing American technological leadership. Her speeches at the DOJ have staked out a position firmly on the side of innovators in the standard-essential patent (SEP) debate — including pointed remarks about the anti-competitive risks of so-called “royalty-free” licensing initiatives — and have been noticed by the innovation community. As Professor Kristen Osenga noted in a recent Clause 8 episode, Kallay’s pronouncements send a meaningful message in how the antitrust division is thinking about patent rights and standards.

🎙️ Related: The Hidden Costs of “Free” Patent Licensing Initiatives

#6 Judge Alan Albright U.S. District Court, Western District of Texas*

Judge Albright has spent his time on the bench as a one-man powerhouse proving that patent cases can be handled as expeditiously outside the EDTX as inside it. What makes his story notable is what he did — and didn’t do — when the pressure came. After an intense campaign targeting his Waco docket, the then WDTX Chief Judge implemented rules in 2022 to randomly reassign new patent cases filed there. Albright moved to Austin — and kept right on handling patent cases with the same approach. While others bent to the pressure, he continued doing what he believed was right. Whatever one thinks about where patent cases should be litigated, Albright stands as a notable example of judicial independence and a reminder of what a federal judge should look like when the pressure is on.

He has also created a playbook for other federal judges who believe that patent cases, like any other cases, should be resolved in a reasonable time. And even for judges who don't adopt his approach, Albright has set a standard they're now aware of — a benchmark for what efficient, predictable resolution can look like.

*Note: This list was finalized before Dani Kass of Law360 broke the news that Judge Albright will step down from the bench at the end of this summer. His impact on patent litigation — and on the standard set for resolving patent cases efficiently — will remain.

🎙️ Related: On Becoming the Go-To Judge for Patent Cases

#5 Nicholas Matich Solicitor, USPTO

You usually wouldn’t expect the USPTO Solicitor to make this list. But Nick Matich isn’t the usual USPTO Solicitor. He served at the USPTO during the last administration and joined the USPTO shortly after Coke Morgan Stewart as acting general counsel before being named Solicitor. Stewart herself has repeatedly credited Matich for his contributions in steering US patent policy in a new direction. The record: in partnership with Stewart, he has compiled a perfect record defending the USPTO’s PTAB-related actions at the Federal Circuit. Beyond the courtroom, Matich has been the architect of the PTAB rules package designed to ensure the changes being put in place now survive beyond this administration. It’s a priority he has pursued from the earliest days of the administration — drawing on lessons from his own previous time at the USPTO, when he watched much of what Director Andrei Iancu accomplished on the PTAB get unwound after the administration changed. As co-chair of the USPTO’s new SEP Working Group, Matich is also helping elevate standards policy as a matter of national importance.

🎙️ Related: Nick Matich on Rulemaking

#4 Senators Thom Tillis & Chris Coons U.S. Senate IP Subcommittee (tied)

No two people have done more to shape the congressional conversation around patent policy in recent years than Senators Tillis and Coons. The three major patent bills currently before Congress — PERA on Section 101, PREVAIL on PTAB reform, and the RESTORE Act on injunctions — are largely products of their efforts. That represents a significant shift from the post-AIA era, when the dominant congressional conversation was about cracking down on so-called “patent trolls.” Even with Tillis having announced his retirement and Coons succeeded on the subcommittee by Senator Adam Schiff, the legislative agenda they built continues to define what discussions around patent reform are focused on Capitol Hill and in the broader patent community.

🎙️ Related: Senator Tillis’ Patent Leadership · Senator Coons’ Staffer Phil Warrick

#3 John Squires Director, USPTO

Opponents of the USPTO’s early action on PTAB post-grant proceedings had hoped that Squires’ confirmation would mean a change in direction. Instead, he quickly proved he was going to proceed with full steam ahead along the path laid out by Coke Morgan Stewart and Nick Matich. His most notable early move: taking full personal responsibility for whether to institute IPR and PGR proceedings rather than delegating that decision — a shift that has meaningfully reduced the number of those proceeding. From his first day in office, he has also made Section 101 reform a priority, issuing guidance designed to bring more predictability to patent eligibility — though the USPTO is still in the early stages of implementation.

How lasting any of this proves to be will depend significantly on what happens legislatively, and on Squires’ ability to get the administration behind the legislative action needed to cement his vision for the patent system. His ultimate legacy will also rest in large part on whether he can improve patent examiner morale — reversing a dynamic that produced a record backlog under the last administration. The playbook already exists: David Kappos tackled a similarly daunting backlog by empowering examiners and encouraging collaboration with applicants, a model that reduced pendency and pushed USPTO morale to number one among federal agencies.

🎙️ Related: USPTO Director Squires’ Foxhole Buddy Tells All · Before He Became Director

#2 Coke Morgan Stewart Deputy Director, USPTO

No acting USPTO director has accomplished more in the role than Coke Morgan Stewart. Named Acting Director on the first day of the Trump administration, she used the role to drive significant change at a pace previously unseen from an acting director — who, historically, have minded the store until a permanent director is confirmed. She moved swiftly to recalibrate post-grant proceedings through her “settled expectations” approach, addressing head-on the perception that patents were subject to endless validity challenges. She also steered the agency through the turbulent early months of the new administration — keeping operations intact, refocusing the office on its core mission of examining patents, and doing all of it while inheriting a significant backlog from her predecessor. The first §101 memo of this administration was also issued under her watch as acting director. The foundation that Squires is building on is largely one she laid, and she continues to support it in her role as Deputy Director.

🎙️ Related: Right Choice for USPTO? · USPTO Changes & Patent Trends · Six Months In · Coke Morgan Stewart & Howard Lutnick

#1 Howard Lutnick Secretary of Commerce

Given that Howard Lutnick has credited patents for allowing him to rebuild Cantor Fitzgerald after 9/11 and is a named inventor on over 400 patents himself, Clause 8 expected him to play an outsized role in shaping America’s patent system as Commerce Secretary. So far, he has exceeded those expectations.

His biggest contribution has been giving USPTO’s political appointees the freedom to operate the agency as a genuinely pro-patent institution, arguably the most pro-patent posture the USPTO has taken since at least Bruce Lehman led it in the 1990s. His familiarity with patents has at times raised alarm in the pro-patent community, including by floating ideas regarding a patent value tax, exercising march-in rights, and taking a cut of universities’ “patent profits.” However, he has proved responsive to that feedback and dialed it back — at a Senate hearing, he declared “we will avoid harming innovation by not doing a valuation, or any valuation fee or tax on patents.”

His legacy with regards to shaping the patent system will rest on whether he can help shepherd the proposed PTAB rules package through the administration — and get the administration behind the legislative changes needed to make the current direction permanent.

🎙️ Related: Patents Saving Cantor Fitzgerald After 9/11 · Ex-USPTO Deputy Laura Peter on Proposals to Seize IP

Hyatt is proposing to donate his foundational AI patents to the Pioneering AI Foundation, designed, in his telling, to give the U.S. government a new kind of leverage at the International Trade Commission (ITC) to use in negotiations with foreign countries. The concept aligns with the administration's priorities and arrives at a moment when the administration's biggest leverage tool — tariffs — has just been narrowed by the Supreme Court's February ruling.

When Hyatt was last on Clause 8 in 2019, he told the story of his role pioneering the microprocessor and the substantial licensing program he built without ever going to court. But much of that conversation was about what came next.

In the mid-1990s, amid scrutiny of so-called "submarine patents," the USPTO created what was later revealed as the SAWS program, which flagged applications from Hyatt and fellow independent inventor Jerome Lemelson and, in effect, kept any more of their applications from issuing as patents. Hyatt later won a unanimous Supreme Court decision against the USPTO in 2012 in litigation arising from that long-running dispute. But that did not lead to any broader resolution. The government kept fighting. More than a decade later, the battle still continues, with another cert petition now pending before the Supreme Court.

None of that makes Hyatt an obvious candidate to be offering the U.S. government anything, let alone a gift.

And yet that is exactly how he frames it: a gift to America, timed to the country’s 250th birthday. On the episode, Hyatt says the administration has “been considering our project for over a year now,” though he is still waiting to see whether it will move forward. As he tells it, the decision is now theirs.

A Strategic Tool

Hyatt explains that the foundation’s mission is to use intellectual property to “level the playing field” for American workers and American interests. Beyond providing leverage in negotiations, he describes a model in which market access could be conditioned on whether foreign manufacturers meet American standards for labor, human rights, and environmental protections — in other words, whether they are willing to play by rules comparable to those imposed on American companies.

Why Give It Away?

Asked why he would hand this to the same government that spent decades blocking his patents, Hyatt doesn’t hesitate:

“America is the dream of immigrants. My parents were legal immigrants. They came over legally, over 100 years ago. And America gave us the dream life… I want to repay America.”

Can this administration finally get it done?

The offer is on the table. It aligns with the administration’s priorities just as its biggest leverage tool has been constrained.

The question isn't whether this administration will entertain it. By Hyatt's account, they have been — for over a year. The real question is whether a dealmaker reputation is enough to close a deal no other administration has come close to making in thirty years.

Hyatt says he is ready to sign.

Will America accept the gift?

The episode covers:

• 00:23 — the ongoing battle with the USPTO

• 02:44 — the Pioneering AI Foundation

• 05:35 — using the ITC and trade agreements as leverage

• 07:11 — human rights and labor unions: leveling the global playing field

• 10:24 — AI in the classroom: the “super headstart” for children

• 12:35 — relieving drudgery: AI as a catalyst for creative thinking

• 14:27 — addressing skepticism: motives and financials

• 16:16 — repaying the dream: the legacy of immigrant parents

• 17:34 — advice for the next generation of inventors

• 18:22 — final thoughts: destiny and helping America

🎧 Listen to the full episode above or on your favorite podcast app—and subscribe to the Clause 8 YouTube channel for bonus content.

📌 Presented by Tradespace – where ideas take flight.

Disclaimer

That question anchors a new Clause 8 conversation between host Eli Mazour and Professor Kristen Osenga, a University of Richmond law professor and one of the leading academic voices on standard essential patents.

At the center of the discussion is the rise of so-called “royalty-free” technology standards. Osenga’s point is straightforward: “free” often comes with strings attached — particularly for smaller innovators that may be required to cross-license valuable patent rights or accept terms they may later regret.

Her main example is the Alliance for Open Media, the tech consortium behind a “royalty-free” video compression standard. The pitch sounds simple: use the standard without paying royalties. But, as Osenga explains, the real question is what companies may be giving up in return — and whether they fully understand the long-term cost of joining.

She offers a simple analogy: a store gives away free croissants to get customers in the door. Customers build habits around it. Then one day the sign changes. In Osenga’s view, the same risk exists here. Companies can build products and business models around terms that may not remain as favorable as they first appeared.

From there, the discussion broadens into the wider ecosystem of royalty-free standards, cross-licensing organizations, defensive patent pledges, and emerging AI-related IP initiatives. What is driving these arrangements? Collaboration? Public relations? Strategic control? And what, exactly, should companies think through before signing on?

As Osenga puts it: “Follow the money … where are these groups making their money? Because it’s probably coming from some other part of their business model.”

The episode also covers:

• what the pattern of withdrawals from major cross-licensing organizations reveals about how these arrangements play out over time

• SEP policy whiplash across US administrations, the Standard Essential Royalties Act (SERA), and where things stand now

• the EU’s proposed SEP framework, and why it stalled

• the litigation funding debate, including why Osenga founded The Inventors Defense Alliance

• the Tillis-Schiff letter to ANSI, China’s push to shape global standards bodies, and the implications for US innovation leadership

• why Osenga believes the RESTORE Act is critical to preserving US innovation leadership

It is a conversation worth sharing with anyone focused on licensing, standards, or innovation policy.

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Disclaimer

Pittman — a serial entrepreneur, inventor, and self-described “foxhole buddy” and “wingman” of Squires — drove up from Georgia to sit down with host Eli Mazour in the Clause 8 studio for this episode, fresh off a meeting with the new director himself. What he shared was a rare inside account of how Squires ended up in the job, what he walked into, and why Pittman believes the USPTO finally has the right person at the helm.

“Andrei went to Trump and said ‘I’ve got your man’”

The short version: it was Pittman who planted the seed.

The moment Trump won, Pittman texted Andrei Iancu — the USPTO director during Trump’s first administration — from a campsite on the trail. Other names were circulating, and he wasn’t a fan of what he was hearing. His answer was John Squires, his own patent attorney. Iancu’s response: Do you think John would do it? Pittman said he’d ask.

When he did, Squires’ first reaction was “Doug, you’ve lost your mind.”

But Pittman kept pushing, and Iancu worked his magic with the new administration. The rest was fate. On the morning of September 11, 2001, Squires walked through the North Tower alongside his friend and neighbor Tommy Cahill, who then headed up the elevators to the 103rd floor Cantor Fitzgerald trading desk. Squires watched Flight 175 hit the South Tower from his Goldman Sachs office and narrowly escaped the debris cloud when the South Tower collapsed. It was the last time he saw Cahill. In the aftermath, as Squires later described in Senate testimony, he filed patents to combat terrorist financing alongside the FBI and Treasury. Lutnick, who lost 658 Cantor Fitzgerald colleagues that day, rebuilt the firm on patents1. The two men's parallel work forged a relationship that would outlast the aftermath of 9/11: when Lutnick became Commerce Secretary, head of the department that includes the USPTO, Squires was the obvious call.

“Andrei went to Trump and said, ‘I’ve got your man.’ Long story short, that’s how John became USPTO nominee.”

In this episode, Doug Pittman discusses:

• Journey from son of a pig farmer to serial entrepreneur, including selling his first tech company during the dot-com boom

• How a billboard spotted on a drive to college with his son inspired the invention that led his first patent, and the years-long journey to get that first patent granted

• Why he cried when the patent arrived — and why tears of joy turned into “tears of unhappiness”

• How Squires led his enforcement strategy and how the twists & turns of that impacted Squires’ view of the patent system

• Litigation funders walking away over Section 101 and PTAB exposure

• The litigation saga, including the experience of having a judge handle a patent case for the first time

• Meeting with former USPTO Director Kathi Vidal and Doug’s unvarnished take on her legacy

• The PTAB problem, the injunctive relief gap, and what needs to happen for independent inventors to feel comfortable with the patent system

• Squires’ upcoming testimony before the House IP committee

• His “1-8-8 Project,” his advice to Squires to “push the limit,” and the personal photo (different from the one above) he sent the director to serve as a daily reminder in his role

🎧 Watch the full episode above or listen on your favorite podcast app—and subscribe to the new Clause 8 YouTube channel for bonus content.

📌 Presented by Tradespace – where ideas take flight.

Disclaimer

That context matters. The previous administration left the USPTO with a record backlog and Section 101 rejection rates that had climbed back to pre-2019 levels — Voice of IP broke that story in June 2024, when 24% of all office actions contained a §101 rejection and the AI art units had hit 77%. The current administration has been working to reverse those trends, issuing new §101 guidance, signaling a more balanced approach to patent eligibility, ramping up the hiring of new examiners, and refocusing the USPTO on its core function of examining patent applications.

For this episode of Clause 8, Eli reached out to Francesca Cruz for her team at Juristat to pull the data together and then invited Clause 8 return guest Clint Mehall to react to the findings in real time.

Who’s actually driving allowances — and why it matters for the backlog

One of the reasons Eli wanted to look at examiner experience data was straightforward: if the administration wants to reduce the backlog, understanding which examiners are positioned to finish examining cases — and under what conditions — is essential.

Some tools that measure examiner behavior use tenure — years at the USPTO — as a proxy for experience. Juristat’s analysis suggests that’s not fully the right metric, and that the number of applications an examiner has actually worked through, at least relative to other examiners in the same art unit or working group, is often a more revealing indicator of their likely approach.

And, as even the USPTO recognizes, primary examiners with full signatory authority operate differently than even “very experienced” examiners who still need supervisor sign-off on allowances.

The findings on how junior, mid-level, and senior examiners actually compare — on office actions, allowance rates, and consistency — are counterintuitive in ways worth digging into. One data point that particularly stood out: it’s often not the newest examiners who tend to produce the longest prosecutions. Clint had a theory for why — invoking the Dunning-Kruger effect — that’s worth hearing in his own words.

The data also highlights something practitioners already sense but rarely see quantified: the variation between individual examiners within the same art unit can be as wide as the variation between entire technology centers. For that reason, examiner-level data is often more useful than art unit averages when thinking about prosecution strategy. Notably, the USPTO's Office of Patent Quality Assurance (OPQA) is now actively working on how to make apples-to-apples comparisons across examiners handling similar technology to identify meaningful deviations. That's a significant development worth watching if the USPTO is able to find a way to address address that variation.

The full breakdown, including how the examiners were classified for the data discussed in this episode will be shared in a dedicated post coming soon.

Interviews after final: what the numbers actually show

The USPTO has recently pointed to data showing that the share of applications receiving at least one interview has grown — from around 30% to roughly 35% since mid-2025. That’s accurate, and interviews are worth doing: Juristat’s data shows allowance rates are roughly 10% points higher for applications where an interview occurred.

Juristat's analysis found that following the recent PAP changes, the number of interviews after final office actions has decreased. However, it's too early to tell whether that remains the case, and if so, what the downstream effects will be.

What happened after the AFCP program ended

When the After Final Consideration Pilot program was discontinued in December 2024, the stated reason was that the cost of the program was too high for the USPTO relative to the benefits. The data confirms that the results of the AFCP program were underwhelming — but discontinuing the program has caused a meaningful shift in examiner and practitioner behavior with potentially negative implications for reducing the backlog.

Allowance rates after final without an RCE have dropped meaningfully since the program ended. At the same time, allowance rates after final with an RCE have edged up. The numbers tell a clear story about how practitioners have adjusted, which Fran and Clint dig into in the episode.

Section 101: early signals, not yet a trend

The August 2025 guidance memo — reinforced when a key PTAB decision became precedential in September — was the clearest signal yet that this administration wants §101 rejection rates to come down. Comprehensive examiner training on the updated guidance is now being planned for rollout later this month, which the USPTO expects will drive more meaningful change in the data over the rest of the year.

The data so far reflects the lag before that training takes effect — overall rates haven’t moved significantly in the aggregate. But there are art-unit-level signals worth watching, particularly in the AI working group, where rejection rates spiked dramatically under the previous administration and have begun to show some movement. Business methods and medical device art units tell a different story, and the episode walks through each of them.

A dedicated Voice of IP post on the §101 data — including art-unit breakdowns and examiner-level outliers — is coming soon.

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📌 Presented by Tradespace – where ideas take flight.

Disclaimer

The conversation traces early debates sparked by the DABUS cases, which framed AI inventorship as a question of whether a machine could be named as an inventor. While those cases clarified that U.S. patent law requires a human inventor, they also highlighted a more practical issue that remains unresolved: how to evaluate human contribution when AI tools play a role in the inventive process, including in areas such as industrial design.

The episode also examines the USPTO’s shifting approach to AI-related inventions, from post-Alice uncertainty to more recent Section 101 guidance and new USPTO Director’s John Squires Ex parte Desjardins PTAB decision. Wen discusses how applicants can position AI inventions as genuine technological improvements, avoid overreliance on “black box” disclosures, and manage Section 112 risks.

The discussion concludes with a forward-looking look at using AI tools for patent practice, the USPTO’s new pilot for AI-powered pre-examination search, and what these developments mean for practitioners and innovators navigating a rapidly changing IP landscape.

Watch the full episode or listen on your favorite podcast app—and subscribe to the new Clause 8 YouTube channel for bonus content.

Presented by Tradespace – where ideas take flight.

Chapters

00:01 – Wen Xie’s early interest in AI and patent law
02:10 – AI disruption before ChatGPT: imaging, medicine, and automation
04:56 – How AI reshaped Wen’s legal career
05:55 – DABUS, Thaler, and the AI inventorship debate
08:56 – Human contribution vs. AI output
10:40 – Should companies restrict inventors from using AI?
11:59 – What in-house counsel should ask about AI use
14:20 – Duty of candor, recordkeeping, and litigation risk
18:06 – Section 101 and AI as technological improvement
22:50 – USPTO guidance, PTAB trends, and examiner behavior
32:01 – Section 112 issues and describing machine learning
33:40 – Using generative AI in patent drafting
39:40 – Advice for junior attorneys in an AI-driven practice

Disclaimer

Under new USPTO leadership, the agency has taken meaningful steps to strengthen patent rights over the last year—from significantly reining in the role of the PTAB in invalidating patents to bringing greater clarity to how Section 101 is applied within the USPTO. But as Peter-Anthony explains, while the steps taken by the agency are promising agency action alone is prone to change and limited to what happens at the USPTO.

That’s where Senator Tillis comes in. Peter-Anthony walks through how PREVAIL and PERA will lock in much of the what the USPTO is doing and provide long-term certainty for innovators. The conversation explores the progress made last Congress, where the sticking points remain, and what it will take for the legislation to finally pass during Senator Tillis final term.

Peter-Anthony is candid about the reality of iterative progress – the coalition building, education, and compromise required - as well as the entrenched interests who have resisted all legislative efforts. At the same time, he describes the slow but meaningful momentum he’s seeing, and why this moment presents an opportunity for the USPTO, Congress, and stakeholders to work together. Before being chosen as USPTO’s acting Director, Coke Morgan Stewart sounded a similar note of optimism about a second Trump administration supporting bi-partisan patent bills.

Peter-Anthony brings a rare vantage point to that assessment. Before coming to Capitol Hill, he served as a frontline Patent Examiner, a Supervisory Patent Examiner, PTAB Branch Chief, and Special Advisor to former USPTO Director Andrei Iancu. He shares the story of following that path and provides insights into how that experience gives him a unique understanding of how patent policy works in practice and what it takes to make meaningful, long-term changes.

The episode also touches on other IP issues at the top of Senator Tillis’ agenda, including copyright and AI, commercial piracy, and performance rights — including Peter-Anthony’s role in planning a recent IP Subcommittee hearing that drew attention for testimony from Gene Simmons.

Eli and Peter-Anthony also discuss their shared North Jersey roots, and how they first met while Peter-Anthony was at the USPTO.

👉 Listen to the full episode—and explore bonus content on the new Clause 8 YouTube channel.

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That question is at the center of this episode of Clause 8, where host Eli Mazour sat down with Subroto Bose, Head of IP at Astera Labs, at the VIA Licensing Alliance’s 2025 Bridge Summit.

Prior to Astera, Subroto held IP leadership roles at global semiconductor companies and standards-driven licensing environments. That breadth of experience informs a central theme of the conversation: effective IP strategy is ultimately about predicting the future. Patents filed today must remain relevant not only at issuance, but across multiple generations of products and shifting market realities.

Astera Labs operates at the intersection of AI and semiconductors, a highly competitive space where multiple companies are advancing the technology in parallel and IP strategy must complement active—and sometimes unpredictable—product development. Subroto brings a rare perspective to that challenge, shaped by earlier experiences growing semiconductor patent portfolios and dealing with non-practicing entities at Altera and Marvell, as well as buying patent portfolios and participating in patent pools at Dolby Laboratories, before taking on the task of building an IP program from scratch at Astera.

During the discussion, Eli and Subroto explore how early-stage companies should prioritize patent filings under budget constraints, why patent quality matters far more than volume, and how IP leaders can embed patent thinking directly into engineering culture rather than treating it as a separate legal function.

Subroto explains why, in a competitive environment, some IP decisions cannot be deferred without consequences—and how that reality shapes what he chooses to protect and when. He also reflects on what years spent reviewing patents as a buyer taught him about identifying real value, and how that buyer’s lens now influences his current role.

He also shares why he decided to sit at a desk inside the engineering area when he joined Astera Labs, and the impact that had on how he learned about new technology and engaged engineers.

The episode also takes a clear-eyed look at the limits of trade secrets, particularly in industries where disclosure to customers and partners is unavoidable and parallel invention is a real risk. Subroto explains why deciding what belongs in a patent versus what can safely remain confidential is rarely straightforward—and why relying on secrecy alone can leave companies exposed.

Finally, Subroto offers advice for those aspiring to become Heads of IP at high-growth Silicon Valley technology companies, reflecting on his own non-linear path into IP leadership, including early litigation work alongside Kathi Vidal before she became USPTO Director.

The conversation offers practical insight for anyone interested in how to design and implement an IP program built for long-term success in fast-moving technology markets.

Watch the full episode or listen on your favorite podcast app—and subscribe to the new Clause 8 YouTube channel for bonus content.

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In this episode, Ceyda and Marcia join Clause 8 host Eli Mazour for a wide-ranging conversation about mentorship, what it really takes to run IP teams inside large technology companies, and what the rise of AI means for both in-house and outside counsel.

They share the story of how they first met at HP, why Ceyda credits Marcia with the advice and encouragement that helped her grow into the Chief IP Counsel role, and what that guidance looks like in practice for other in-house lawyers navigating their own careers.

The conversation also dives into HP’s experience with high-stakes litigation and how those lessons shape its global patent portfolio strategy. Ceyda also offers a behind-the-scenes look at HP’s IP team restructure—why early attempts fell short and what finally made the new model work. The discussion delivers practical takeaways for anyone building or leading an in-house IP team, balancing portfolio development with business goals, or working to make IP more central to company decisions.

The episode closes with a candid, practical discussion of AI—what it means for the expectations placed on outside counsel, how in-house teams are already using it, and what lawyers need to do to continue delivering real value as the pace of work accelerates.

Together, Ceyda and Marcia offer a rare, grounded look at mentorship, leadership, and the future of IP inside major tech companies.

👉 Listen to the full episode—and explore more conversations shaping the future of IP—on the Clause 8 YouTube channel.

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Dorini described patent pools as “great democratizers of technology,” helping both licensors and implementers navigate increasingly complex standards environments. As regulatory scrutiny intensifies across the U.S., Europe, and Asia, he noted that pools are evolving in response, finding new ways to balance transparency with practical, market-driven licensing solutions.

Brown expanded on this theme from Dolby’s internal perspective. He outlined how Dolby ensures the strength and essentiality of its patent portfolio — through direct participation in standards development, rigorous internal analysis, and independent evaluations. These processes, he explained, are critical not only for maintaining high-quality SEP assets but for building trust across the licensing market.

Both speakers also pointed forward. As Dolby’s technologies extend into areas such as wireless power, EV charging, and other emerging platforms, the role of patent pools is likely to expand. While the fundamental structure of pools may remain consistent, their scope and global influence continue to grow, driven by new implementers, new licensors, and new technological frontiers.

🎧 Watch the full episode or listen on your favorite podcast app.

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In the latest episode of Clause 8, the focus turns to how the USPTO’s evolving approach to post-grant proceedings at the PTAB is shaping the broader patent policy debate—and influencing what Congress may (or may not) do next.

The episode features David Jones, Executive Director of the High Tech Inventors Alliance (HTIA) and a longtime Clause 8 favorite, alongside Jeffrey Hantson, a former patent litigator and senior Senate Judiciary Committee staffer who most recently served as Deputy General Counsel to Sen. Dick Durbin after advising Sen. Mazie Hirono on IP issues. Dave and Jeff first crossed paths during the pre-pandemic Section 101 roundtables, and the episode captures their fun, wonky back-and-forth dynamic.

A central theme is whether the USPTO’s recent moves on IPR institution—including its Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM)—create an opening for Congress to strike a bargain, or instead make legislative compromise harder. Dave and Jeff explore how the introduction of settled expectations, Director John Squires reclaiming institution authority, and broader institution trends are reshaping the conversation around proposals such as the PREVAIL Act.

Jeff frames the core tension in familiar terms for staffers and stakeholders: at some point, should the USPTO be done reassessing a patent’s validity? Dave, for his part, is skeptical that legislation is the answer when the agency is (in his view) drifting from what was envisioned when Congress created the PTAB under the America Invents Act (AIA).

The conversation also explores why PREVAIL advanced further than PERA in the last Congress, why PTAB reform is often easier to grasp on Capitol Hill than Section 101 eligibility, and why Sen. Thom Tillis’ likability—and impending retirement—may matter more than most people realize.

Set against a backdrop of shifting IP leadership on Capitol Hill and mixed administrative signals on patents, the episode offers a candid look at where patent policy may be headed—and what it would take to change course.

🎧 Watch the full episode or listen on your favorite podcast app—and subscribe to the new Clause 8 YouTube channel for bonus content.

From the archives:

• Iancu and Jones Debate Section 101: https://www.voiceofip.com/p/iancu-and-jones-debate-section-101

• HTIA’s David Jones on Winning in DC: https://www.voiceofip.com/p/htias-david-jones-on-winning-in-dc-335

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As Global Head of IP at Novartis, Salsberg has a unique vantage point on how legal uncertainty affects the future of healthcare innovations. His work testifying before Congress has placed him at the center of the debate over the Supreme Court’s Mayo, Myriad, and Alice decisions — rulings that he thinks have been followed by years of instability around Section 101, threatening investment in critical biotech and diagnostic breakthroughs.

The conversation explores the political landscape surrounding the Patent Eligibility Restoration Act (PERA), the persistence of myths like “patent thickets,” and the consequences of letting misinformation shape innovation policy. It also highlights what Congress can do to prevent the U.S. from falling behind in the race for gene and AI-driven therapeutics.

Ultimately, Salsberg’s perspective underscores how constructive, good-faith dialogue across industries remains essential to safeguarding innovation.

🎧 Listen to the full episode now on the Clause 8 Podcast.

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Their conversation traces the evolution of patent pools — from the early days of MPEG LA and antitrust uncertainty to today’s complex, global licensing ecosystem.

Garrard Beeney recalls how early skepticism toward joint licensing eventually gave way to an appreciation of how collaboration between innovators can expand access, reduce friction, and drive technological growth. He warns, however, that increasing regulatory interference — particularly in Europe — risks undermining a system that largely works.

John Sideris brings the perspective of a major technology innovator. He discusses how Philips built a licensing culture that values both innovation and fairness, explaining why patent pools remain one of the most efficient and balanced ways to manage IP rights. He also shares a rare insider view into how companies factor intellectual property costs into product development — and why responsible licensing keeps the innovation cycle healthy.

Together, their insights offer a window into how markets, not mandates, can sustain innovation — and why listening across the licensor-licensee divide remains essential for the future of IP.

🔔 Listen now via the Clause 8 Podcast
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The announcement sparked questions and concerns about what the changes — including new interview time limits, a new streamlined review process, and increased production expectations - will mean in practice.

In this Clause 8 episode, Eli Mazour speaks with Jerry Lorengo, a Deputy Commissioner for Patents who helped lead the process for figuring out and implementing the changes over the last six months. Jerry joined the USPTO as an examiner in 1996, became an SPE nine years later, and has since held multiple senior leadership roles.

In this episode, Jerry:

• Walks through the process that led to the changes

• Discusses the impact of new production expectations on examiners

• Breaks news that the new streamlined review process — originally announced to focus on “all independent claims and any dependent claims indicated as allowable” — has now been changed to focus on all independent claims (rejected and allowed)

• Contrasts the new streamlined review framework - designed to front-load quality review to expedite and improve examination across the art unit - with the reviled “second pair of eyes” review program that undid allowances after extensive examination

• Explains why it’s not appropriate for SPEs to tell examiners to “keep looking” for prior art

• Clarifies that despite new interview policy, examiners and SPEs are expected to continue to facilitate applicant-initiated interviews to advance prosecution

• Shares practical advice for succeeding at the USPTO — from both the examiner’s and applicant’s perspectives

• Discusses how the USPTO plans to monitor and adjust the policies based on data and feedback from applicants, practitioners, examiners, and SPEs

🎧 Watch or listen to the full episode and find additional bonus content on the new Clause 8 YouTube channel.

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Lisa’s path into inventing began after her family moved to Brooklyn, New York, where her creativity and curiosity found room to grow. She started inventing at a young age, driven by the simple desire to solve everyday problems. That curiosity evolved into a lifelong passion for turning ideas into reality. Her first major success—the Bosom Buddy breastfeeding cape—opened doors to retail shelves, QVC appearances, and a deep understanding of what it truly takes to bring a product to market.

In our conversation, Lisa and I talk about what inventors often learn the hard way: that success requires persistence, self-belief, and an understanding of both patents and business. She shares how she built Inventing from A to Z, a company that helps independent inventors navigate everything from concept to commercialization, and why she tells every creator:

“A patent doesn’t sell your product—you do.”

Lisa also offers insights for patent attorneys—encouraging them to ask inventors where they see their product being sold before diving into legal protection. Her perspective bridges the gap between invention and entrepreneurship, showing how passion and practicality go hand in hand.

For anyone ready to turn ideas into impact, Lisa’s story is both inspiring and instructive. Her new book, “The Inventress’s Guide to Inventing The Right Way: All Or Nothing, Now Or Never”, is an essential companion for creators determined to make their vision real.

🎧 Listen to the Full Episode now on YouTube here
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