Provisional Patent Content Review

[unixserv]

What is the name of your state? Georgia

I'm currently working with a company that I would like to exclusively license my invention to.
While at the table discussing the next step, the CEO said I should provide them with a copy of my provisional patent application so they can assertain the "defendability" of my language.
Am I crazy or is this a good time to move away from the table, so to speak?
I don't want my laymanesque language to be reverse engineered by their lawyers and it seems like giving this to them would subject me to just such a risk, even with a non-comp/non-disc. Is there a way to placate them and keep my concepts (and all subsequent changes and variations) intact as my property?

Thanks

 

[divgradcurl]

Am I crazy or is this a good time to move away from the table, so to speak?

Who knows? The thing is, their request may not be that unreasonable. When you finally convert to a nonprovisional application, only that which was disclosed in the provisional application is entitled to the filing date of the provisional patent -- any new matter that is disclosed for the first time in the nonprovisional app only gets the benefit of the nonprovisional filing date.

This could be very important -- if you failed to disclose a fundamental part of your invention in the provisional application, and you are in a fast-moving industry, then anything you failed to disclose in the provisional app may potentially be patented by someone else, if they can get their application in before you get your nonprovisional filed.

And even more fundamental, they probably want to see if the provisional patent will be defendable at all. Sometimes (and I don't know if this is the issue in your case) individual inventors who file their own provisionals will write up their application fairly narrowly, so that only their invention is covered. That would seem to be the right thing to do -- but in reality, a narrow patent is very difficult to defend, since a narrow patent can often be easily designed around. These people may want to review your application to see if what you have disclosed in potentially broad enough to make it worthwhile.

I don't want my laymanesque language to be reverse engineered by their lawyers and it seems like giving this to them would subject me to just such a risk, even with a non-comp/non-disc.

Your layman's language is really irrelevant, especially in a provisional, so there's nothing to worry about there. They probably are only interested in figuring out what you did and did not disclose, and to make sure that your actual invention was disclosed, and in broad enough terms to make it worthwhile.

Is there a way to placate them and keep my concepts (and all subsequent changes and variations) intact as my property?

Placate them? Who knows. As far as keeping your property, well, the way you do that is by filing a patent, which you already have.

From a practical standpoint, look at it from their point of view. You are asking them to invest in your invention -- would you be willing to invest in someone else's invention without knowing what the invention actually was?