Inventor Has Waited 43 Years For Patent Approval

An anonymous reader writes "If you think the average wait of 28.3 months for a patent to be approved is ridiculous, don't complain to Gilbert P. Hyatt. The 76-year-old inventor has been waiting over forty years for a ruling on whether his electronic signal to control machinery should be granted a patent. 'It's totally unconscionable,' said Brad Wright, a patent lawyer with Banner & Witcoff in Washington who specializes in computer-related applications and isn't involved in Hyatt's case. 'The patent office doesn't want to be embarrassed that they might issue a broad patent that would have a sweeping impact on the technology sector. Rather than be embarrassed, they're just bottling it up.'"

Comments

How could it be valid?

[DarkOx]

Seems like prior art should be easy to find, people have had relays on things longer than 43 years, or is this patent going to try and distinguish between electronic and electromechanical controls?

Re:How could it be valid?

[Arker]

He did not invent the microprocessor.

He filed a fanciful patent application describing the possibility, waited until someone else figured out how to make it reality, then sued them.

He might be the patent troll patient zero.

Re:How could it be valid?

[Raenex]

This guy invented the microprocessor

Under dispute. Actually, he eventually lost his patent, but not until after he managed to extract millions in licensing fees from it. An anti-Hyatt page.

successfully sued the state of California for nearly $400 million because they tried to extort taxes he didn't owe out of him

Whether he owes them or not is still not settled. He won money from California on the basis of a Nevada jury for California's auditory process. The bottom line is that he moved to Las Vegas to avoid California taxes from his license windfall.

So far, everything he's done relating to tech has been righteous imo, let's cut him some slack.

From the article: "While some of Hyatt's patents predate or are contemporary with those granted to executives at Intel and Texas Instruments Inc., those companies made products that changed the world, Bassett said.

"I respect Gilbert Hyatt's work -- the process of engineering is difficult," Bassett said in a telephone interview. "But innovations are more than ideas. The broader context matters. If Gilbert Hyatt had never existed, I believe the microprocessor would have developed in the same way that it did.""

Re:How could it be valid?

[litehacksaur111]

Horse shit. The microprocessor was the work of people like Bill Shockley, Robert Noyce, Gordon Moore, Jay Last, etc. This guy patented some overly broad concept and tried to use those rights to patent troll.

Re:How could it be valid?

[Anonymous Coward]

From http://www.intel4004.com/hyatt.htm The Gilbert Hyatt Patent
A patent on the microcontroller, predating the only two Intel patents related to the MCS-4, was granted to Gilbert Hyatt in 1990. This patent described the architecture and logic design of a microcontroller, claiming that it could be integrated into a single chip. This patent was later invalidated in a patent interference case brought forth by Texas Instruments, on account that the device it described was never implemented and was not implementable with the technology available at the time of the invention.

So he made a patent without means or know how to implement it. Essentially like a patent for cold fusion even though you don't know how it would be done you patent it.

Re:How could it be valid?

[geekoid]

Looka t his inventions and their timing.
1996 - Patents the Kernel
1989 - Patents the microprocessor.

A little late to the game, don't you think?
Oh, but when he gets denied, it turns into a large court case where he continually files for appeal, WHILE collecting royalties. And then when he loses he stop collecting royalties; which he doesn't have to pay back.

Go here:
http://patft.uspto.gov/netahtm...

Search for this:
in/Hyatt AND Gilbert

Read some of his patents. He is the original patent troll. One who submits patent for things that exists, and then extract royalties from companies while it's "Patent Pending".

This Licensing = trolling is a ridiculous definition of patent troll. One that got the patent office to change in a way that is far worse for the small time no money inventor.,

Re:That's one heck of a very **BROAD** Patent !

[eclectro]

Haven't carried out a detail search on the said patent,

You won't be able to, either. The article states that due to age of the patent, the application is confidential.

Without seeing the application, it's difficult to tell what its validity is. But when this patent application was filed in 1971, electronic control of machinery was already quite widespread. So, it would have to be quite specific about its implementation. Then there is the question of making companies pay for something they knew nothing about.

In the end, congress would have the power to invalidate this patent outright, if they wanted to.

He patented the microprocessor, too

[don.g]

As Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microprocessor#Gilbert_Hyatt) says:

    Gilbert Hyatt was awarded a patent claiming an invention pre-dating both TI and Intel, describing a "microcontroller".[9] The patent was later invalidated, but not before substantial royalties were paid out.[10][11]

And from http://www.intel4004.com/hyatt...:

    "This patent was later invalidated in a patent interference case brought forth by Texas Instruments, on account that the device it described was never implemented and was not implementable with the technology available at the time of the invention. "

I know that 1990 (when that microprocessor patent was granted) is pre-Slashdot, but srsly, what's happening when patent trolls' whinging is front page news here?

Re:That's one heck of a very **BROAD** Patent !

[Baloroth]

"if TFA's description is to be believable" Why should this be a matter of speculation? You can look at the claims yourself.

Unfortunately, we can't. From TFA:

Because the filings are so old, they fall under a law that keeps them confidential, said Patrick Ross, a PTO spokesman. That means the office can't discuss them or even say how many pending patent applications predate a 1995 change in the law, Ross said.

Slanted beyond all comprehension

[craighansen]

Article seems to be talking about patent application 05/302771, and the status of the case is miles away from the way it's described in the article. This patent has been through several levels of non-final and final rejections, appeals, and court actions. Through the USPTO's public PAIR (Patent Application Information Retrieval) system, you can access hundreds of pages of information and history on the case, including what are now several hundred pending claims. Even if the application itself hasn't been published, the file history is ripe with lots of information. You can see the patent examiners' rejections and there's a 494-page appeal brief filed on behalf of the Applicant, from which you can see many of the pending claims. The patent office rejections appear mainly under section 112 on the basis that the claims aren't adequately supported by the patent disclosure. It's not as if he just applied for the patent and waited 43 years - he's been trying hard not to take NO for the answer.

In addition, there appear to be about 150 additional patent cases filed as continuations on dates between 1977 and 1995 - some still pending and some abandoned. Most of them aren't accessible under the public PAIR system because of the pre-1995 filing dates. Presumably there's no continuations filed after 1995 because under the post-1995 rules, the application would expire 20 years from the earliest filing date, so they'd expire before granting. If many of these continuations have hundreds of claims like the parent case, there could be tens of thousands of claims that he's trying to get granted.