Selfie Stick Patent Expiring_Market opportunity or big trap

The patent right of the famous utility model selfie stick patent “an integrated selfie device” will expire on September 10, 2024, which means that the technical solution in this patent will no longer be protected by patents and will enter the public domain.

This patent has been declared invalid 30 times, and it is said that the patent owner has initiated more than 5,000 infringement lawsuits and obtained nearly 100 million yuan.

1.The glorious history of the selfie stick patent

The patent application date is September 11, 2014. The core technical point of the protection is “the clamping device is integrally rotatably connected to the top of the telescopic rod”.

After the patent was granted, the patentee began to “operate” and launched “rights protection” activities across the country, so it has also experienced multiple invalidations. From public information, it can be seen that the patent has been sued for infringement 30 times. Except for one “partial invalidation” in 2016, the rest have maintained the validity of all patent rights, that is, claims 2-12 are currently valid, so the current protection scope is:

（1）An integrated selfie device, comprising a telescopic rod and a clamping device for clamping a shooting device, the clamping device comprising a stage and a stretchable clamping mechanism disposed above the stage, characterized in that: the clamping device is integrally rotatably connected to the top of the telescopic rod.

（2）The selfie device according to claim 1, characterized in that: a notch is disposed on the stage, the clamping mechanism is provided with a bending portion corresponding to the position of the notch, and the telescopic rod can be accommodated in the notch and the bending portion after being folded.

This protection range is still very large for a selfie stick product.

2.The significance of the selfie stick patent expiration

The protection period of utility models is 10 years, so this patent will expire on September 10 this year.

The expiration of the patent protection period means that the patent rights have expired, and anyone can freely implement the technology or invention originally protected by the patent without obtaining the patent owner’s permission or paying any fees.

3.Is there no risk at all?

After the patent holder of the selfie stick understood the economic benefits brought by the patent, he began to apply for a large number of patents since 2017, mainly involving shooting auxiliary equipment.

Even if a patent has expired or is invalid, there may still be other risks, such as the patent owner has laid out other related patents:

（1）Related patent chain

The patent owner may have a series of related patents that together cover different aspects of a technology or product.

Even if one patent has expired, other related patents may still be valid, thus limiting your freedom to implement the technology or product.

（2）Improvement patent

The patent owner may have improved the original patented technology and applied for a new patent.

Even if you use the original technology, you may still infringe these improvement patents if you involve improvements.

（3）Patent portfolio

Some technologies may consist of multiple patents (called patent portfolios or patent pools).

Although one of the patents has expired, the overall technology may still be protected by other patents.

（4）Patent extension

In certain specific cases, such as pharmaceuticals and agricultural chemicals, the patent owner can apply for an extension of the patent protection period, which means that the patent may be longer than the usual protection period.

（5）Undisclosed part of patent review

During the patent application process, some improvements or new applications may still be under review and have not yet been disclosed.

If these applications are approved, they will form new patents in the future, which may affect your implementation of related technologies.

4.Patent protection: the key factor between success and failure

The selfie stick is a successful case, but it is not accidental, but there are actually many such opportunities.

In the process of the author’s contact with corporate clients, it was found that quite a few companies, regardless of size, had once had “very recognized” technologies. Unfortunately, due to the lack of a good agent to write patent application documents, the economic value such as the selfie stick patent was not realized.

The author once encountered such a client who promised that after the successful protection of rights, all compensation would be given to the author, and he only needed to stop the infringement and regain market share. As a result, the author looked at their patents and could only decline. These patents either have too small a protection scope, and the other party does not constitute infringement at all, or the rights are unstable and can be easily invalidated.

Therefore, whether a technology can realize economic value through patent protection requires “time, place and people”, that is:

（1）Good technology

I believe that innovation is not big or small, and what is recognized by the market is good innovation.

（2）Good patent documents

How to write patent documents is the key to whether the rights protection can be successful; and once it is written badly, it is almost impossible to save it later.

（3）Good operation

The willingness of the patent owner to carry out rights protection work and the operation of the professional team.

This part is very long to expand, so I will not expand it here.

Original:“自拍杆专利9月到期：解锁市场自由的机会还是隐藏风险的陷阱？”

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