Legal Question in Intellectual Property in Pennsylvania

Re: infringed on a patent

To answer your first question, I have to point out that there are two kinds of patents that might be pertinent here. One kind is a DESIGN PATENT, which would protect the "look" of a product. The other is a regular, or UTILITY, PATENT, which would define the invention by a set of numbered "claims" printed in the patent document.

If a company has a valid DESIGN PATENT for a product, and if the patent is still within the 14-year term, then it would be an unlawful infringement of the patent for someone else to make, use, sell, or import a product that has a look that embodies the protected design without permission from the company.

If a company has a valid utility patent that is still within its term (including payment of periodic maintenance fees), then it would be an unlawful infringement of the patent for someone else to make, use, sell, or import without permission a product that is within the scope of any of the numbered claims printed in the issued patent. Unfortunately, the legal task of interpreting (or "construing") a patent claim is often tricky; words in a patent claim don't always mean what they seem to say.

As a practical matter, it might not be worthwhile for a patent owner to go to court to enforce a design patent or utility patent against someone who makes a single product for personal use. But in principle, the patent owner would have that right, even if the accused product is hand made.

On the other hand, if the accused product is made so that the maker can experiment with the principles emdobied in the invention, perhaps to design a "better mousetrap," then the product might be excused from being an unlawful infringement. Rather it would fall within a narrow exception to the patent laws regarding infringement, for academic, experimental use of the invention.

To respond to your second question, copyright law protects the words used by an author to express something. Trademark law protects text and/or graphics used to identify the source of a product. In general, it would be a lawful "fair use" of another company's trademark to truthfully distinguish one's product from a product of the other company.