Our Services

Shumaker & Sieffert provides high-quality application and prosecution services including Patent Prosecution, IP Strategy, and IP Portfolio Engineering. Our attorneys focus on delivering expert advice and navigating complex patent issues for our clients. We assist our clients in building valuable patent portfolios through patent application preparation and prosecution and counsel our clients to address patent infringement risks.

Patent Prosecution

We have engineered our processes to deliver high-quality application and prosecution work on a timely basis. Our technical and legal skills, along with our extensive experience, support our objective of performing these services with minimal disruption to inventors and in-house counsel. Shumaker & Sieffert is well-versed in patent application drafting, with all attorneys trained to tailor patent drafting and prosecution strategies to achieve client goals. Whether helping inventors extrapolate their ideas toward broad patent coverage or focusing protection on particular commercial sectors or products, our processes center around each client’s individual objectives. Our patent attorneys strive to advance prosecution while balancing delay and iteration, preserving claim scope and validity, and consistently delivering a high-quality end product.

Shumaker & Sieffert patent attorneys not only file a large number of PCT applications, we also prosecute most of them through Chapter II examination. Prosecution of PCT applications can place an application in position for prompt and favorable consideration upon national phase filing and provides the firm with important experience working with European Patent Office (EPO) and other International Patent Examining Authority (IPEA) patent examiners.

We frequently use tools that expedite applications to issuance. For example, we have extensive experience with Track One prioritized examination in the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), and we use Track One prosecution history and results in the USPTO to inform international filing and prosecution strategies as well as to expedite examination in other countries.

IP Strategy

Shumaker & Sieffert patent attorneys have extensive experience in counseling clients regarding patent infringement risk. We understand that patent infringement disputes can present costly obstacles whenever introducing a new product or entering a new business. Effectively identifying and avoiding potential patent infringement problems is essential to keeping our clients’ businesses running smoothly. Our IP Strategy services help to mitigate these risks.

Whether addressing acute patent infringement risks with noninfringement and/or invalidity opinions, conferring with engineers to develop design-around options, or surveying a market segment to evaluate freedom-to-operate, our attorneys can help to reduce patent infringement risk while pursuing business opportunities.

Our patent attorneys also assist with patent infringement studies, including pre-suit investigations. Building a substantive legal case of patent infringement for “hand-off’ to trial counsel is another strength of the firm’s patent attorneys and can help potential plaintiffs mitigate litigation costs.

IP Portfolio Engineering

Shumaker & Sieffert patent attorneys are frequently called upon to assist in the engineering of patent portfolios. Whether conducting “invention scrubs” with inventors to extract and protect potentially patentable subject matter, identifying opportunities to expand coverage, or evaluating existing portfolio assets for scope and value, our attorneys are adept at assisting clients with developing and leveraging their patent assets.

For example, our patent attorneys’ portfolio analysis skills support clients as they seek to maintain strength in core areas requiring exclusivity, enhance protection in thinner segments of their portfolio, and compare coverage to competitive patents to evaluate relative portfolio strength.

At the same time, Shumaker & Sieffert patent attorneys can provide recommendations for cost-effective portfolio management, including U.S. and foreign patent filing recommendations and advice regarding maintenance and pruning of existing portfolio assets.