USPTO Issues 700,000th Design Patent

The USPTO recently did a press release about the issuance of the 700,000th design patent. The patent for the ornamental design for a “Hand-Held Learning Apparatus” was issued to Jason Avery of Berkeley, California and is currently assigned to Emeryville, California-based LeapFrog Enterprises, Inc. (NYSE: LF).

In case you did not already know a design patent protects the physical appearance of a product, including software graphics such as user interfaces and icons. To determine what is protected in a design patent, you would look at the drawings. The drawings will contain three types of lines: solid lines, dashed lines, and shading lines. The solid lines indicate the part of the design that is protected by the patent, the dashed lines indicate ‘optional’ parts of the design that aren’t protected by the design patent, and the shading lines indicate the surface and its texture.

You can find all this information by using the USPTO patent search tool. Just type “US D700000 S1” in the search field, this will lead you to a plethora of information including drawings and patent claims and methods.

This milestone is significant because it shows the size to which our patent office has grown. Our Intellectual property system is a catalyst grow growth in innovation. “The design area has increased from twenty five and a half thousand applications in 2009 to just over thirty five thousand filings in 2013” said Deputy Director of the USPTO Michelle Lee .

TLDR

Leapfrog got issued the 700,000^th design patent. Rate of growth for patent issuance has increased by over 30% in the past 5 years.

About Design Patent Number 700,000
The LeapsterGS™, delivers more than 40 different learning and play experiences for children ages four to nine, and features a hi-res finger-touch screen, and Flash and 3D graphics. The device is ergonomically designed with small children in mind, yet is simple, with bold and fun design features. It stores information about a child’s progress and adjusts game and activity challenges in real-time, for learning adventures that keep kids going on their own path, at their own pace. And select titles also let players customize the curriculum, selecting their own spelling words or mathematics skill sets to load into games, effectively “doing their homework” as they play.

If you are interested in more detail related to your situation it is best to speak with an attorney.