1)What blockchain will be used?
Polygon & Ethereum. I also have the testnet works like rinkeby and omatic. It is best to use testnet first, you need to get test tokens.
2)How many patent licenses can be made?
This is up to you. BUT you have to indicate this in the License. For example License No 2 of 100, means in the Patent life time you can only issue 100 and this is license no 2. You should never issue ALL 100 at the same time. Issue 10 first and see how the responses are. In my case I issue only 1.
3)Will the contract be valid in the US?
Yes the contract can be made under US Laws for IS jurisdiction. Remember when you want to enforce a US Patent then BOTH parties have to be in US or at least the licensee has to be in the US. To be fair, no Licensee will buy a US Patent license unless they intend to use this in US. For example licensee will not buy a US Patent License and use it in Russia or overseas. They can just use it without a license. As long as they (licensees) is in US then you can sue them for breach. No point suing some licensee in Russia or China for breaching a US Patent license.
4)How do I prove ownership of my patent to potential
Licensees?
The usual way your Patent has an address we can search on PAIR, the Licensee can send you a physical mail. I know the lawyers do this as part of due diligence. In my case I will certainly check to make sure you are the owner or patentee as well.
5)How do I prove to you that I own my patent?
I will send you a paper letter with a secret word inside to the address stated in your patent correspondence address and I ask you to come back to me with that word.
6)What will the NFT include?
Metadata anything you want to put there as you can see from my own. On opensea, you can put date of issue, title of patent, patent number etc But also a URL link to the license tailor for the NFT. This will be vide ipfs see my example https://tinyurl.com/nftpatent
7)Do I need to pay for minting the NFTs?
No at the moment using my contract on poly.nftpatent.net
8)Do I need to pay gas fees?
Yes, this will be around less than USD 1. (using MATIC)
9)If I have to pay minting or gas fees, how much will
they be?
See above.
10)What may need to be revised in the NFT?
No sure what you mean here, NFT is basically a serial number. You cannot revise this number as it is created by the smartcontract. For example the NFT is labelled in https://opensea.io/assets/matic/0x7338809d1a2c6fbb6e755470ab2a28e8c5dac63c/1
The gibberish “0x7338809d1a2c6fbb6e755470ab2a28e8c5dac63c/1” represents the NFT. Actually the “1” is the ID for the NFT. So when you create your own NFT on my contract it will be “2” or “3” all in running order. That is the meaning of NFT meaning they are unique as it had an ID. The first part “0x7338809d1a2c6fbb6e755470ab2a28e8c5dac63c” represents the contract that was created. If you cut and paste this on polygon network, you will also be able to see transaction number and so on like meta data and everything link to the NFT. https://polygonscan.com/address/0x7338809d1a2c6fbb6e755470ab2a28e8c5dac63c
11)What software do you use to write the NFT?
The NFT is written in solidity which you can see here
https://polygonscan.com/address/0x7338809d1a2c6fbb6e755470ab2a28e8c5dac63c#code
The interface you see on https://poly.nftpatent.net is using React linking to the smartcontract that is posted on the block-chain.
12)How do you write the NFT? (what
process)
Not sure what you mean here. The program is solidity https://ethereum.org/en/developers/
The developer’s tool https://remix.ethereum.org/ or you can use MSFT VScode. https://code.visualstudio.com/download
13)How do I pay you through Upwork?
I think Upwork will send you a bill directly and keep the funds on trust until the work is complete, then you can ask the funds to be released to me.
Happy to answer more if you have further or give me a call. I think you have not asked me how do I control and manage the NFTs and what features I have built into the smart-contract to maintain control etc. That is why you are actually paying me. The power is in the smartcontract as I can track and burn the NFTs as the smartcontract is within my control. Hence as I told you, this smart-contract is free to use by anyone. I will be developing my own OpenSea later for IP putting all transactions under my preview. For now, I am asking people to understand the concept first as it is fairly new. If you are aware of the IPXI fiasco https://scholarship.law.cornell.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3D4730&context=3Dclr
I have designed this to avoid some of the issues, so it is not possible for me to give you a lesson in patent licensing, it takes a full-time course to do this. Therefore, you need to test this yourself see if this is right for you or you want to use the traditional way using “royalty” instead.
14)My patent lawyer's firm's address is listed on my
patent. How do we do due dilligence then?
In the case where your law firm’s address is listed on your
patent, and I presume you are using this law firm then I will send a letter to
the law firm and ask them to deliver the secret password (sealed in an
envelope) to the owner of the patent. I suppose it is also up to you to update
information on your patent vide USPTO to your address (in my case I use a P.O.Box) or maintain with
your
lawyer. If you use your lawyer then you should notify them to expect such a
letter.
15)How do you control and manage the NFT?
This is in the code written on the contract. For this first
beta, there are two main control – ownership and burning. I understand most
patentee or licensor wants to have this ‘control’ but I am thinking this should
be part of the exchange platform, a neutral party so to speak in case there is
any dispute later. As I mention I do not want a situation where anyone can issue
a patent NFT, there must be a trusted market even a curated one.
I am using ERC721 which means I can only issue ONE NFT at a
time. All the features are found in ERC721 documentation. I am however thinking
of ERC1155, the difference being issue MORE than one NFT at a time. Problem is
that you can’t see the NFT in your wallet nor in etherscan.
For a list of the features https://polygonscan.com/address/0x7338809d1a2c6fbb6e755470ab2a28e8c5dac63c#writeContract
Again this is for the current
contract that is build into the poly.nftpatent.net
and not the full ERC721.
16) Can you burn them at any time or will you transfer
control to me?
Yes it is possible to have your own
“private” NFT patent license label whereas patentee has full control of the
smartcontract. This is a paid service and not the same as
using my platform which is free as I mentioned yesterday on the polygon
network. My aim is to build an IP exchange similar to =
opensea
where the platform manage all the NTFs on a standard
contract basis.
17) Can anyone burn or transfer the NFT?
The burning is exclusive to the contract creator, ie from the person’s wallet who
posted the contract to the block-chain. Whoever created this contract is like
the Super User in Linux. So he or she can create other
Super User hence the ability to transfer control to the next. Super User can do
anything including transfer the NFT to the Patentee or to anyone. Super User
here can also lock the NFT (ie no one can transfer including the License who has bought the NFT)
18)Would including a royalty on secondary sales of
the patent licenses constitute a security on my end?
In my licensing model there is no “royalty”. The Licensee
bid for the NFT (for example up to USD 1 mio of
revenue per year) and pay an upfront fee. The Licensee will buy a second NFT if
his profitability increases beyond the allowed in the first NFT. The Patentee
will schedule the sale of the NFTs from time to time up to the max contracted (ie remember the 100 figure I
mentioned earlier or any figure but it is built into the contract) or else the
Licensee has to go back to the market to buy secondary NFTs. It
is like the shares of a company, it must be a known figure as this represents
the “value” of the patent. Hence this is a market model requiring some
‘management’ after issuance.
However, you can also use OpenSea
directly to create your NFT if you want to have “royalty” component. My very
first NFT was created using Opensea but there are pro
and cons. By using Opensea, then again Opensea will have ‘control’ component with them. OpenSea uses a “proxy” contract hence you can see ALL their codes and it also means they can update their codes from time to time
(which kinda defeat the purpose of block-chain being
immutable). I am not criticising them because there are too many bad codes and
will need cure in the future and their whole business will crash if they cannot
fix those bugs. Note: when I say OpenSea, I mean any
exchanges that uses ERC721 standard. Ie check out
others too.
As to the point of security, glad you ask this. I think this
is the MOST important part and that is not getting in front of the SEC’s face.
The answer is no because
1.
NFT is a license not a security (obviously SEC
will not like this answer but is a fact).
2.
It is not an investment as a patent license
actually has a diminishing value effect as a Patent has limited lifetime of 20
years. An investment like BTC will last forever as long as there are computers
running the block-chain.
3.
Yes, there will be expectation of profits as the Licensee expects to use the technology to make profits.
4.
But no common enterprise between Patentee and
Licensee as the Patentee is not involve with what the Licensee is doing or
selling other than making sure Licensee is in compliance with the terms of
license. A patentee who wants to license normally will not ‘use’ his patent
else may be in competition with licensee. This can happen though by defining geographic
areas.
5.
However, as I mentioned some buyers will buy NFT
in the hope that they can profit from other’s work (ie those who make products and $$ given that they
will cross the USD 1 Mio mark and need to get a second NFT). This is last of
the Howey Test. To get around this, there is a requirement in the License that the NFT holder reveals their revenue and identities within 12 months of purchase. If they do not their NFT will be burn and Patentee will be able to reissue this NFT again. This clearly shows the NTF is not an asset for
investment but for usage means. This drastic measure is to protect the Patentee
and Exchange (as the burn part is executed by Exchange). This can be built into
the smartcontract too if needed later. I use 12
months in my standard contract but one can change this to 24 months given some
inventions may take time to get started. Say for vaccine, there is a lead time
of at least 12 months.
6.
Also, it is important to know who the licensee
is which is a big stumbling block in one-to-one negotiation since there will be
party wishing to remain anonymous to get a license to “try it out”. There will
not be biased as all NFTs are offered online to all. That is why block-chain is
so useful for me. Also
the party will need to show reveal themselves in any dispute.
18)What information would you need from me to write the licensing terms for the patent?
Actually, this is the part where you do not have to as
the licensing terms are standardised. https://www.nftpatent.net/GenericLic.pdf
You can read through this and is important. That is the
whole reason why I create NFT Patent license because of the cost involve with customising such a license to patentees. Note that this is a generic license and therefore must be customised according to each NFT issue
ie License No XXX of XXX (YEAR
issue) need to be printed on the document before linked with the NFT meta-data.
Obviously, it has to be posted first to IPFS.
19)Do I need a patent lawyer to write the licensing
terms or do you write the licensing terms for me?
It is up to you. I have already written the standard license
as stated above. You can get a copy in WORD from me and make changes. No
Licensing is “perfect” as they say until we litigate.
20)When will your OpenSea for
patents be made?
Currently working on this. I have been travelling since
air-travel is allowed now without much hassle. Primarily why I am behind is
because I am trying to find out more about OpenSea’s
codes. They do not release everything on Github
and I notice there are some features missing. In short, they release version 0.05
while they are using 0.1 online. I guess that is how they keep ahead.