Intellectual Property

3 Questions For A Patent App Developer

Accio Patent is an example of what can happen when you merge your professional needs with your coding capabilities to create a tool that can help your practice.

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(Image via Accio Patent)

The career arcs of many IP lawyers are full of interesting twists and turns. Along the way, some actually find themselves creating something — whether related to their practice or not — that becomes useful to others. This week’s interviewee, Corey McCaffrey, is one such creator, who has developed and released an app that helps patent attorneys and agents access PDF copies of patents faster. His career path is an interesting one, spanning stints in tech, Biglaw, and now in-house. Corey started programming when he was nine years old. Growing up, his family had an Apple IIGS, and he found an Applesoft BASIC programming tutorial tucked away among the manuals. He made some simple games and got hooked on the creative and technical power that computer programming unlocked. Eventually, Corey went on to study computer science at MIT.

After college, he worked as a software engineer for IBM. Corey learned a lot about patents at IBM, which inspired him to transition to a career in patent law. After law school, he worked for a Biglaw firm in D.C. for a few years before moving in-house. Today, Corey is an in-house intellectual property and privacy counsel for a high-tech company in D.C., and still enjoys coding as a hobby in his spare time. Along the way, Corey went to Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference in 2008, where he watched Steve Jobs unveil the new App Store alongside the second-generation iPhone. He has been interested in developing mobile apps ever since, leading to the development of Accio Patent. 

As usual, I have added some brief commentary to Corey’s answers below, but have otherwise presented his answers as he provided them. The content and opinions expressed by Corey are his own and do not represent the views of his former or current employers.

Immediately below are my written questions and Corey’s answers.

1) Describe why patent attorneys and their clients should be using your app.

Accio Patent fetches PDF copies of patents quickly using a barcode scanner or keypad. The app retrieves the patents and (optionally) syncs them to your Dropbox or iCloud account.

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Patents and publications from the USPTO, EPO, WIPO, and other patent offices have barcodes. I couldn’t find any tools for patent professionals to scan those barcodes, so I decided to make one. Accio Patent scans the barcodes on printed patents or cover pages. Barcode scanning is a fast and fun way to download e-copies of patents.

You can also dial a patent number on the telephone-like keypad. I use this feature when I read a new Office Action. I can key in the cited references, and just a few moments later I have PDF copies synced to my computer and ready to review. Accio Patent is also handy for retrieving patents whenever you see patent numbers in a complaint, Information Disclosure Statement, presentation, news article, virtual patent marking webpages, and more.

GK: Every patent lawyer knows better than to expect that the USPTO and other patent offices will make the latest document retrieval and storage technology available. In fact, when I showed my high school students the USPTO website earlier this year, they thought it was a joke when I navigated to the patent search page. Like I forgot to pay a membership fee for access to the real website or something. While Google Patents and other services have helped make things a little easier, there is no doubt that patent lawyers and agents would benefit from more modern options — such as Accio Patent’s solution directed at retrieving PDF copies of patents.

2) What lessons did you take from your time as a Biglaw patent attorney that influenced the development of Accio Patent?

Although I had left my career in software engineering, I never lost my enthusiasm for technology. During my time at a firm, I applied that enthusiasm toward finding software tools that could help me work on client matters as efficiently and effectively as I could.

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When it came to patents, I relied heavily on Espacenet and the other excellent resources available from the European Patent Office, in addition to data services from other patent offices around the world. I wrote simple computer programs to retrieve and analyze patent data. The knowledge I gained about these data services helped me realize that I had the interest and ability to make an app like Accio Patent. And I have a lot of other ideas for new features and other apps that will continue to make working with patents simpler and more enjoyable.

GK: Need spurs innovation. Even while Biglaw firms tend to offer at least some modern legal tech tools to their lawyers and staff, those solutions are often directed to general aspects of legal practice. For specialists like patent attorneys and patent support staff, bespoke solutions are often necessary. Corey admirably merged his professional needs with his coding capabilities to create tools that have helped his practice. And now Accio Patent is his first contribution to the patent community to help everyone do their work more efficiently.

3) How did moving in-house spur your development of Accio Patent?

At the law firm, I practiced patent law exclusively and first got the idea to create Accio Patent. After moving in-house, I had more opportunities to explore other areas of law, especially privacy law. Privacy became a priority for my app.

I did away with half-baked plans for some combination of targeted advertising, user registration, and usage tracking and analytics. The end result is much simpler and private: anyone can download and use my app immediately, without having to register or send any personal information or other data back to me. When you use Accio Patent, I do not know who you are or which patents you are searching for.

GK: Corey offers a very interesting perspective on privacy issues. We are used to apps requesting all kinds of “permissions” — often asking for access to our personal data with little or no seeming connection to the app’s actual purpose or utility. His sensitivity to privacy issues is welcome, as is the lack of concern Accio Patent’s users can have that they are somehow sharing confidential client information or work product with the app developer. Hopefully more legal tech apps will adopt a similar approach to privacy issues, even if it hampers their data collection efforts to some degree.

My thanks to Corey for the insights and cooperation, and I wish him continued success and fulfillment with his legal career and Accio Patent. It is always a privilege to hear from an up-and-coming IP personality, especially one with such a big role to play in developing a useful bit of technology for IP lawyers to use. I am always open to conducting interviews of this type with other IP thought leaders, so feel free to reach out if you have a compelling perspective to offer.

Please feel free to send comments or questions to me at gkroub@kskiplaw.com or via Twitter: @gkroub. Any topic suggestions or thoughts are most welcome.

Gaston Kroub lives in Brooklyn and is a founding partner of Kroub, Silbersher & Kolmykov PLLC, an intellectual property litigation boutique, and Markman Advisors LLC, a leading consultancy on patent issues for the investment community. Gaston’s practice focuses on intellectual property litigation and related counseling, with a strong focus on patent matters. You can reach him at gkroub@kskiplaw.com or follow him on Twitter: @gkroub.

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