The Technology Commercialization Office (TCO) serves the UGA community by connecting industry with university expertise and inventions for the public good, promoting economic development and increasing research visibility. The University of Georgia Research Foundation (UGARF) administers all intellectual property at The University of Georgia.

UGARF covers all the costs of patenting an invention. After an invention is licensed, UGARF typically asks the licensee to reimburse these expenses.

Any employee of The University of Georgia is required to disclose an invention to TCO. Students may also disclose inventions to TCO.

UGARF has inter-institutional agreements with many universities, research institutes and other organizations, and could likely negotiate such an agreement with your collaborator’s institution. This type of agreement determines which institution would take the lead in patenting and licensing the invention, as well as how any royalty income would be shared. Employees of other institutions are not required to sign this document but should be listed on the form.

After you publish, present or otherwise publicly disclose your invention, you have one year from the first disclosure date to file a U.S. patent. After this anniversary has passed, you lose all U.S. patent rights. For foreign patents, no grace period exists; that is, publication (or any form of disclosure) of your invention immediately bars you from foreign patent rights.

TCO does file foreign patents on inventions, depending on the level of licensing interest, the overall market size and the potential market share for the technology. Typically, only licensed technologies will be considered for foreign filings.

There may be several reasons for not filing a patent on an invention:

• The invention may be obsolete before the patent is issued.
• The invention may not be a strong patent candidate.
• The invention may be dominated by other patents (or other patents may be needed for freedom to practice).
• The invention may not be commercially attractive (it may be early stage, in a market of limited size or with strong competitive forces, or involve regulatory approval issues).
• The patent may not be enforceable (i.e. it is difficult to tell if someone is using the invention).
• The invention may be obvious, as defined by U.S. Patent Law, to someone skilled in the art and in light of previously known information in the field. To receive a patent, an invention must be “nonobvious.”

An inventor is a person who contributes significant creative input into an invention. An inventor is one who makes a contribution to at least one novel and nonobvious concept that makes the invention patentable.

If each had a share in the ideas forming the invention as defined in the claims – even if only as to one claim, they are joint inventors and a patent will be issued to them jointly on the basis of a proper patent application. If, on the other hand, one of these persons has provided all of the ideas of the invention, and the other has only followed instructions in making it, the person who contributed the ideas is the sole inventor and the patent application and patent shall be in his/her name alone.