[This is a copy of a post in another thread. This is just to keep this one live.]
Axil wrote:I humbly ask the experts in patent law that frequent this thread to share their judgment about the intellectual property protection afforded a “method” of catalytic activity that is provided as opposed to the catalyst as a “material”.
If the only way to take advantage of a [any] nickel cataytic material is to "inject hydrogen into a metal tube filled by a nickel powder, even of nanometric dimensions, or nickel granules or bars, in a high temperature and pressurized hydrogen gas saturated environment" then his patent is solid.
However, if such a powder can be used to liberate energy in other ways, then his patent is weak because one would merely have to use it in that other way to avoid infringement.
So essentially this patent is relying on the fact that Rossi's secret pixie powder cannot be used in any other way, other than inside a metal tube (which, seeing as he has admitted he doesn't really know why it works, is not only a risk too far, but probably makes it contestable).
In terms of opinion as to method or material, in this case I do not think any IP specialist would hesitate in saying that it is the pixie powder that is the substance to patent. Merely patenting the material would ensure it could then not be used in any other configuration, which seems an enormously more powerful patent.
I could offer more useful advice if I were paid enough. For example, if he knows enough about his invention then he could probably pick a specific aspect of the process and patent that, rather than either the apparatus or the material.
That is, he's patented apparatus, he could've patented material [but not in all jurisdictions] but he could've avoided giving away his secret sauce by, for example, patenting the
control of the catalytic reaction. viz. he's said that he can control the rate of the reaction by controlling the heat input. So, what he could [still, perhaps] patent is 'a method in which means are provided to deliver external heat to a hydrogen-nickel reactor thereby controlling its exothermal energy output'. There y'go - no mention of fusion reactions, no special sauce, and fully enabled because anyone can do those steps.
In a patent, sometimes it is better to pick an unusual, but necessary, process feature. If you patent one necessary part of a process, the whole process is effectively patented. Even better, others might then improve other parts of the process, and be motivated to do so themselves by getting their own patents on the other parts of it. Then you work together and everyone makes money who has contributed.
A good example is the Wright Bros, who patented the flight control but not the aeroplane. A bad example is Boulton and Watt who cornered the steam engine market and suffocated innovation for a couple of decades. {IIRC: Once their patent [which they had managed to persuade Parliament to extend] expired, the innovation on steam engines exploded and power and efficiency, that had been stagnant under their licencing, trebled within a decade. see
http://mises.org/daily/3280 }