Charlotte Intellectual Property Lawyer

Filing patents and building IP that supports the business are two different things. Before drafting begins, we look at what your company needs the patent to accomplish: your business goals, product plans, competitors, whether infringement would be detectable, your budget, and any licensing or exit plans. If there’s no clear reason to file, we’d rather pause and define the strategy first.

The drafting then follows that strategy. A patent meant to support licensing discussions may need a different approach from one meant to protect your competitive position.

Our core practice is patent prosecution: provisional and non-provisional applications, responses to USPTO Office Actions, and continuation and divisional strategies that can keep claims pending as your product changes.

When a launch, funding round, or acquisition is coming, we handle freedom-to-operate (FTO) analyses, prior art searches, patent opinions, and patent due diligence for acquisitions, licensing, and financings.

On the brand side, we handle trademark prosecution and portfolio management, including international trademark filings under the Madrid Protocol, Paris Convention priority filings, and direct national filings. For patents abroad, we file Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) applications and coordinate foreign filings. We also counsel companies on trade secret protection.

Our core technology areas include software, AI and machine learning, cybersecurity, wireless, electronics, and medical devices. We’ve also prosecuted patents in biotechnology, chemistry, mechanical engineering, renewable energy, and AgTech.

The U.S. follows a first-inventor-to-file system, so your filing date can decide who gets rights to an invention. A provisional application secures an early date while your engineers are still refining the product. You then have 12 months to file the non-provisional application and claim that date.

During examination, the USPTO may reject claims under 35 U.S.C. § 101 for subject matter eligibility, which can be at issue for software and AI inventions, or under Section 102 (anticipation), Section 103 (obviousness), or Section 112 (written description, enablement, and definiteness). Your responses shape the issued claims, and arguments made during prosecution can limit how the patent is interpreted later.

Federal registration with the USPTO gives you nationwide priority in your mark for the goods or services listed, subject to the rights of earlier users. You can file based on current use of the mark in commerce or on a bona fide intent to use it.

The USPTO examines each application for likelihood of confusion under 15 U.S.C. § 1052(d) and for descriptiveness under Section 1052(e)(1). Approved marks are published for opposition, and registered marks need periodic maintenance filings. U.S. registration doesn’t protect your mark in other countries, and Paris Convention priority runs only six months from your U.S. filing date, so if you plan to sell abroad, plan the foreign filings early.

• Technical fluency. Our attorneys and patent agents include engineers and scientists who understand how products are designed and built. Managing Partner Doug Meier is an electrical engineer who worked on software for NASA’s Space Shuttle program.
• Strategy before paperwork. Patent decisions should support your business goals and product roadmap.
• Litigation-informed drafting. We consider how claims may be challenged, designed around, or used in a business setting.

NK Patent Law has been recognized by Legal 500 U.S. Elite, Best Lawyers in America for Intellectual Property, Business North Carolina Legal Elite, and the Chambers USA Regional Spotlight Guide.