If your you think you are confused due to your weak English skills; trust me it is not that, as patent law is Greek to everyone. 
Statement From Andrea Rossi on IH Patent Application
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This document would suggest that Rossi did not sign the paperwork to make the WIPO version of an application.
https://patentscope.wipo.int/s…09/RO101/WO2014179183.pdf
Found at:
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This fellow, Nifong, is apparently a local patent attorney. Typical application process is USPTO first, and quickly followed thereafter by a PCT filing, and then specific countries. The patent application text for PCT filings are usually identical to USPTO and the paperwork for filing USPTO and PCT are typically all signed at the same meeting. So, probably Rossi signed the PCT papers at the same time as the USPTO papers. Other countries not part of PCT (Patent Cooperation Treaty) require the patents written in their language which requires a special technical translator and an attorney from that country usually. This would typically require a signature meeting after the translations were created. I don't know if this patent was filed in any countries other than US and PCT.
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Rossi sent a pdf of the patent application he's referring to to Frank @ e-catworld who posted it: http://www.e-catworld.com/wp-c…2016/04/R_123621412_3.pdf
What I find interesting is that looking up that patent on USPTO site (http://portal.uspto.gov/pair/P... - after captcha entry search for 61821914), under 'Image File Wrapper' tab it has a Filing Receipt document - which says Andrea Rossi was the applicant and it was filed in 2013. Also, nowhere on the patent application is Industrial Heat listed as an applicant, an assignee, or a co-inventor (there is only one mention of Industrial Heat and it's in the Lawyer's address).
Additionally, the patent application retrieved through the USPTO website has the application split into multiple PDF documents, all with the provisional patent # stamped in top left corner. The document sent by Rossi to Frank is one single complete PDF document with no patent # stamps - therefore most likely the original.
Why does Rossi have the original document in his possession if, as he claims, this was an application he just became aware of and in no way authorized? Why also would he make a fuss about this if IH is not listed anywhere as a party to the application filing? Am I missing something?
My interpretation is that this is Rossi leaking information and falsely spinning it to drum up public support. It's a positioning effort.
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I think it may take David French, retired Patent Attorney, friend of LENR, frequent contributor on CFNs, to put this all together. This is very complex.
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@David - Rossi, real or fake? IMHO, Rossi has working LENR technology. My guess is that he doesn't understand it well enough to make it reliable - I.E. operates continuously with easy computer control. I also think Rossi may have held back from IH key components of the recipe to make the reaction work in the core eCat technology.
I think the hotCat technology does demonstrate LENR, but the COP is <2 and is not a commercially viable technology (at least not yet). Rossi may say he gave them everything they needed for the hotCat technology, but that does not mean that he gave them the recipe for the core eCat. And, as I said, I don't think IH can make money from the hotCat technology at its stage of development.
I am sure the agreement with IH would not have been, "if you can discover my recipe, then you can use it under licence." Such agreements usually require that the inventor teach the receiving party how to build, engineer, and maintain the apparatus to produce the same good results as the inventor obtains (or better results).
If IH felt they had received what they needed from Rossi to enter commercialization (demonstrated reliability and output from a device Rossi taught IH to build), then IH would be foolish not to just continue forward to manufacturing the product under license from Rossi. They would make a ton of money. I just don't think IH is foolish in that regard. I believe that IH believes they have no way to move forward with what they can build based on what Rossi has taught them.
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I get the feeling that the discovery of the XCat changed Rossi's attitude toward his old E-Cat design. This change reflected a realization that the E-Cat wasted a lot of Rossi’s time and energy. As is always his way, Rossi wants to move away from the old E-Cat tech and concentrate on the new and magical XCat tech. But the deal that Rossi has with IH will hold Rossi back and force the production of the E-Cat. This need to make all his present and future products based on the new Quark conflicts with the need for IH to sell the E-Cat now. IH does not want to fund an open ended reactor R&D effort in perpetuity. This conflict of objectives between these two is a strain on the relationship between IH and Rossi.
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Of course one simple explanation for all this is that IH does not have the $89 million and thus could not make the required payment. $89 million in cash is a very large sum in the cold fusion world, in any venue. Such sums are almost always contested and delayed in business and industry requiring all manner of posturing by the parties before the 'settlement' is reached.
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"Meanwhile Rossi has made significant progress in understanding how his hotcat process works and can be improved."
Or perhaps, the original E-cat is not stable enough to sell in practical applications and Rossi is holding out on the "new improved version" as a teaser so as to collect the $89 million.
But Rossi is not claiming that the X-Cat is a stable design yet.Darden may believe that neither Cat is working well enough to sell into a production environment so he is getting Brillouin to work on improvements and refusing to pay for something that works only in a highly technician-ready-to-repair environment.
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"I get the feeling that the discovery of the XCat changed Rossi's attitude toward his old E-Cat design."
Or perhaps Rossi has never gotten either Cat to perform long-term without someone there to fix it when it breaks.
Let us say you invent the Internal Combustion Engine but that your design only works for a week until it breaks down. How much is your "brilliant invention" worth?d
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"I get the feeling that the discovery of the XCat changed Rossi's attitude toward his old E-Cat design."
Or perhaps Rossi has never gotten either Cat to perform long-term without someone there to fix it when it breaks.
Let us say you invent the Internal Combustion Engine but that your design only works for a week until it breaks down. How much is your "brilliant invention" worth?d
Just like the first windows operating systems that failed 10 times a day, that software was NOT mission critical for many years. It takes years to remove the bugs that cause failures and this process cannot be rushed. Any new LENR reactor will fail regularly and this should be expected. IH must expect to spend time (years) debugging the commercial product up until it is stable enough for product release. This is how product development goes.
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Quote from Bob
I think the hotCat technology does demonstrate LENR, but the COP is <2 and is not a commercially viable technology (at least not yet).
As a matter of interest Bob which tests lead you to that conclusion? The Penon tests are all COP > 2, and the Lugano test is COP = 1 to within errors which admittedly are large.
Rossi's own tests were giving much higher COP (if you believe them). And Rossi latest test claims much higher COP.
Also, the hot-cat tests we have reports for all worked reliably with a third party tester and no weird adjusting of things. That does not mean it is plain sailing to scale up and commercialise, but maybe somone more competent than Rossi would not find it so difficult.
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@David ... I have been away for a while trying to spend more time in the lab and less on the computer.
First let me explain "specious" ... A statement that is "specious" sounds on the surface like it is true, but when closely examined it turns out to be false.
Rossi is claiming that IH is "filing patents in his name", and while that may be true, these patents cannot be filed in the US Patent office without the inventor signing the application. This means that Rossi knew about the application when it was created and he agreed to file that patent the way it was written, or he would not have signed the application.
Rossi is also claiming that IH is claiming ownership of the patent that was filed. If IH is not an inventor, then "ownership" comes as a formal assignment of the patent by Rossi (inventor) to IH (assignee). Normally someone who has paid for the research, or by contract has rights to inventions, will expect to receive assignment. However, Rossi would have had to sign an assignment agreement for the patent to be assigned to IH. AND, such and assignment must be signed for every patent that is going to be assigned. While IH may have a contract term with Rossi that says that Rossi must assign these patents, Rossi must still sign papers for each patent to enable the assignment to IH.
It is not possible for IH to file a patent application or an assignment without Rossi agreeing and signing the papers.
So, for Rossi to come out now and say that IH is filing these patents and claiming ownership, is a ploy to induce sympathy from those that read his statements. The truth is that Rossi signed the papers to allow IH to file each of the patents they have filed. If the patent is assigned to IH, then Rossi signed documents to assign it to IH. IH did not "steal" ownership of anything from Rossi, Rossi voluntarily signed papers for assignment of the patents in exchange for something (contracts require something of value to have been given and received to be valid).
Lastly, it is the person(s) named as inventor(s) that is claiming that the technology in the patent works. That means that Rossi, by signing the patent application, was claiming that the technology worked as it was disclosed. There is no implied claim by the assignee of the patent (IH) to the US Patent office that the technology worked. However, by spending the money to pursue the patent, there is some evidence that IH believed the patent to be valuable.
According to GED as follow:
QuoteDisplay MoreAs others have pointed out, the US patent law changed in 2012 to make it easier to file without an inventor signing, So Bob is actually wrong there. To wit: "An entity can file an application on behalf of an inventor who assigned or is under an obligation to assign the invention rights to the entity (or if the entity otherwise has financial interest in the invention), without seeking the inventor's execution of the application.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/…Smith_America_Invents_Act
Leahy-Smith America Invents ActAlso IH's Dameron (on the patent IH filed) is also listed as inventor, which means they fall into the category of standing behind the technology as working.
Still, a good view to consider.
IH could indeed legally file the patent without Rossi signing it (or even knowing about it), and Bob is just not up to date on that fact. The new US patent laws have allowed a lot of... Well, there are a lot of people who view the new laws as letting corporations step all over small time inventors, for reasons like these.
Still, Rossi's contract does seem to allow IH to file without him signing (or knowing). So, he may lose this point of contention. Depends on how the court views the new patent laws and those clauses in the contract. Rossi may not have realized the intersection of the new patent laws with his contract, and just what it all could lead to.
But when did Rossi sign the contract? Was the new patent law in effect at the time that Rossi signed the contract? If Rossi's contract preceded the new law, what version of the law applies?
Rossi had to have signed the contract before the 24 hour test IH had carried out with Penon, which was in May of 2013. But, some provisions of the new law didn't go into effect till 2013, and I'm not sure if this filing provision was one of those or one of the 2012 ones. And in the case of the last question, I have no idea, but that is exactly the sort of decisive ruling that would have to be battled out in court.
I have a feeling that the contract was in place after the applicable provisions of new law went into effect though.
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@David,
Who can say what Rossi's plan is? I have never met the gentleman. It will be interesting to see how it plays out. -
@padam73 also note that the file Rossi sent Frank is an original document (no stamped patent # in top left of each page), whereas any documents pulled from the USPTO site have that # stamped.
If Rossi is in possession of the original document, then how can he claim he had no idea about this patent application until now?
This clearly appears to either be his patent application or at least one he knew about well in advance of today... Which would make his statements false and misleading - no wonder he has since pulled them off of JONP.
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Rossi's complaint about the patent application may indicate what would explain a lot.
He has literally lost his mind.
The Complaint in the lawsuit reads like a paranoid rant which includes some facts that might be a basis for suit. The complaint about the patent is incoherent, and the pdf mailed is, as pointed out above, evidence that he already had a copy of this patent.
The whole complaint about filing of patents seems beside the point, it is paranoid expectation.
IH isn't making money yet. Of course, IH may have been making money from selling power from the 1 MW unit to the "customer." The customer was a company set up by Rossi's lawyer's friend in order to perform the test. This was not an existing plant using power, it was created for purpose. So it could have been Rossi, through the customer, paying IH for power. "Up to $1000 per day," from the Complaint. That, then forms the basis for treating IH as doing business in Florida, so that he can sue them there instead of in North Carolina. The whole thing stinks.
That claim of Florida jurisdiction might fail.
The Agreement between Rossi and IH was designed to have IH run a completely independent test of the 1 MW power plant. As it developed, Rossi ran the test, living there. Even if all the test results were as claimed -- and we don't know that because the report hasn't been released -- this was a setup for continued suspicion that something was awry.
My guess is that Rossi refused to transfer the IP when the $10 million progress payment was made. So IH could not independetly make and test units. It's looking to me as if Rossi insisted on the Guaranteed Performance Test being run his way, and that IH decided to play along, to see what would happen.
I don't know if IH adequately protected themselves. (But I would expect they would have.) There much we don't know. We may know more if and when IH formally answers the lawsuit.
Rossi is probably claiming perfidy so that he can require punitive damages. I doubt that it will fly. That would be, then, why he is looking for proof that they have done something wrong. i.e., with the patents.
Rossi has done many things over the years that were chalked up to "eccentricity." If he had devices capable of generating, say, 10 kW reliably, in 2011, he could have been selling them as investigational devices within a year. Many people pointed out the difficulties of testing a 1 MW plant vs a 10 to 20 kW device. But Rossi always had his own way.
Maybe it has gone beyond eccentricity. I cannot see an advantage to Rossi from suing IH. Maybe he is not as smart as Mats Lewan seems to think. Maybe he is just plain insane.
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Abd,
I agree with all that, except:
QuoteHe has literally lost his mind.
I don't think his behaviour now is inconsistent from before - he has always been paranoid and refused friendly advise. He has always made irrational comments. The difference now is that he is going to lose $89M that he hoped to get. That is a big deal and must hurt. People do stupid things to get back at those they think have hurt them.
He can keep his devoted ECW followers I expect, but after this split will find it hard to get new funding. The $10m could keep him going for a while, depending on how many people he has, and how expensive is the legal action.
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Interesting info on Florida litigation process:
Note that the case is being brought before a federal district court, which happens to be in Florida. The US federal procedural rules are separate from (Florida) state rules, although the description you link to appears to be discussing both. But, if it wasn't clear, the matter is a federal one for several reasons mentioned in the first part of the suit. -
It would amazing that Rossi could keep them at such a distance from the experiment throughout the year that they couldn't make an assessment of the experiment, it seems unbelievable but if so it could very well still be a long con by Rossi.
I can make sense of the recent turn of events by assuming that Rossi is eccentric and paranoid and believes that he has real technology (even if he in fact doesn't really, because it hasn't been properly assessed). I cannot make sense of things by assuming that Rossi is running a long confidence game. There are many reasons for this, but one is that he's hired a lawyer with only four years of practice, while he must be aware that IH can hire the best lawyers in the world to defend them, and can allow the suit to take as long as is required to exonerate them in full. If Rossi were doing anything obviously flakey that was materially relevant to the suit (e.g., the "customer" really is an entity controlled by Rossi rather than one he found and hid behind a shell company, or he's been feeding bad data into the measurement instruments), this stuff would be likely to turn up during discovery or during the trial. He would lose the suit and be liable to further charges. -
It is easy to see the Rossi action as IH withdrawing from the license agreement. But all IH have done is refused to pay $89M now because they think Rossi has not yet met its conditions by giving them working technology. They would, I guess, be happy enough to go on trying indefinitely, with the $89M as strong incentive for Rossi to help them get stuff to work. But, I guess, for Rossi if they renege on the $89M they are snakes and he will go into full battle mode.
Another (speculative) possibility is that Rossi has been approached by new investors, and (a) his agreements with IH are constraining what he can do without involving IH and (b) IH have expressed doubts about the rigor of the tests that have been used for previous milestones as well as the current one. In this scenario, Rossi believes himself to be in a position of strength and IH to have miscalculated and is suing to recuperate damages while he continues on with the new opportunity.
