Patent Services

Patent Searches

A novelty search is often conducted by patent attorneys, patent agents or professional patent searchers before an inventor applies for a patent.

A novelty search helps an inventor to determine if his invention is novel . The search may include searching in patent applications, databases of patents and other documents such as utility models and in the scientific literature.

A validity search is done after a patent is issued. The purpose of a validity search is to find prior art that the patent examiner overlooked so that a patent can be declared invalid.

This might be done by an entity infringing on the patent, or it might be done by a patent owner or other entity that has a financial stake in a patent to confirm the validity of a patent.

A clearance search check if the given invention violates someone else's existing patent and may be limited to a particular country and group of countries, or a specific market.

Smit & Van Wyk, Inc. services include patent / novelty searches to prove that your invention is novel and unique.