The Golf Industry's Source for IP News
http://golf-patents.com
Syndicate
Follow Me on Twitter
Golf Inventions, Patents, and Technology via The IP Golf Guy (aka The Golf Patent Attorney)
Golf Ball Patents of the Week
Two interesting golf ball patents issued this week (January 16, 2007), one assigned to Acushnet and the other to Taylor Made Golf. Acushnet’s new patent is USPN 7,163,472 titled “Golf Ball Dimples With A Catenary Curve Profile.” The ‘472 patent is directed to a ball with dimples defined by the revolution of a catenary curve about its symmetrical axis. The ‘472 patent is well written and deserves reading, not to mention it will refresh your memory regarding hyperbolic sine and cosine functions. Perhaps the most interesting aspect of this patent is the prosecution history. The ...<< MORE >>
USGA Rules on Clubs and Balls: Prevent Over-reliance on Tech Advances and Preserve Skills Differentials
This is the first post of many on the USGA’s “A Guide To the Rules on Clubs and Balls.” The Guide is available online; however a printed copy should be on the desk of everyone involved in ball and club design. The USGA should be commended on the Guide as it is extremely well written and contains commentary and numerous illustrations explaining the rules. It is the “Introduction” that is the focus of this post. Particularly, the following sentence: While not wishing to stifle innovation, the purpose of the equipment Rules is ...<< MORE >>
Published App of the Week – Acushnet’s Explosion Welding Multi-Material Club Face
The published US patent application of the week (January 11, 2007) goes to Acushnet's multi-material club face patent application (Pub. No. US2007/0010346). The application is directed to joining a striking surface to a club head, constructed of a different material, using solid state bonding (in this case explosion welding). There is no doubt that material joining technology will take club head design and construction to the next level. ...<< MORE >>
Competitive Intelligence – Simple Trademark Research Identifies Competitors' New Products
The Trademark Branding Cap blog recently published two good posts on monitoring your competitors’ trademark filings to forecast new product launches and marketing campaigns. The first post provides an example search that you could run every month to monitor your main competitors. The second post goes a little deeper into trademark competitive analysis. Let’s imagine you are a club manufacturer and you want check out your competitors’ trademark filings in December 2006. Simply go to the USPTO advanced trademark search page, insert the following in the dialogue box, and press the “submit query” button. ...<< MORE >>
Practice, No Thanks – One of These Golf Tees Will Solve All My Problems
Practice… why practice, I plan to invent a product that makes golf easy. Given the plethora of wacky golf tee patents, this line of thinking must be fairly common. However, it is probably a lot easier for the average golfer to achieve a sizable payday by inventing the next new hot golf product than it would be making it on the Tour. The USGA may have something to say about the legality of the following patented golf tees, but they are nonetheless very interesting. First, U.S. Patent No. 4,367,879 follows the simple principle of controlling ...<< MORE >>
Putters - Design or Utility Patent
For calendar year 2005, there were sixty-four patents granted on putter related inventions. Of the sixty-four patents granted, thirty-seven of them were design patents, while twenty-seven were utility patents. However, this simple statistic does not tell the whole story. Very few manufacturers would ever admit that a putter's design is simply ornamental, or that it was designed merely to be aesthetically pleasing. According to most manufacturers, the design of their putters is attributable to a functional performance improvement that is only found in their product. Therefore I suspect that at least 50% of the ...<< MORE >>
Classic Putter Patents - Fun and Educational
My first substantive post... not too serious, yet educational and informative. A historic look at patents covering the classic putters that we all know and love. Notice that these classics were all protected by utility patents, in addition to design patents. A future post will more closely examine putter patents and whether more are filed as utility applications or design applications.This patented putter got the ball rolling for what would eventually become the Ping Golf Company. The late Karsten Solheim filed a patent application covering the PING 1A putter on March 23, 1959, which eventually issued as U.S. Pat. No. ...<< MORE >>
About Me - David Dawsey - The I.P. Golf Guy
Welcome to www.Golf-Patents.com. My name is David Dawsey, the I.P. Golf Guy. I am a patent attorney with a love for the game of golf and everything about it. Recently I found that I was spending several hours each week researching intellectual property issues regarding the golf industry (for my own amusement). This included following new products and technology, recently published patent applications and recently issued patents, what the industry leaders are doing related to intellectual property, and intellectual property litigation concerning the golf industry. Then, in those famous last words, I said to myself "self, it can't be that ...<< MORE >>
Golf-Patents: Terms of Use
David Dawsey (“Me,” “Myself,” and “I”) offer this blog as a service to you subject to the following terms and conditions of use (“Terms”). By accessing, creating, or contributing to the Golf-Patents blog (“Blog”), and in consideration for the blog service that I provide to you, you agree to abide by these Terms. 1. Rights in the Content You Submit Any and all works of authorship copyrightable by you and posted by you to Blog are submitted under a fully paid up license to Me. ...<< MORE >>
