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[Patentstudent]

I will try to explain the question I am facing now by giving a fictional example that resembles my case.

We developed a method and a system for automatic irrigation of a lawn. The method involves providing small amounts of water mixed with a liquid fertilizer to the soil directly surrounding the roots of the grass. The primary system according to the invention comprises a dense grid of perforated tubing that has to be installed just below the surface prior to the sowing of grass seeds for the creation of the lawn. The use of a mixture of water and liquid fertilizer, the construction of the grid and the method of positioning the grid are novel.

Then there is a mobile system that can be used for existing lawns that don't have the grid system. This mobile system has a matrix of tubes protruding perpendicularly to the plane of the system. These protruding tubes can be pressed into the ground in order to deliver the water/fertilizer mixture close to the roots of a certain percentage of the grass plants of the lawn. With this mobile system a much smaller percentage of the grass of the lawn will receive the water/fertilizer mixture in the direct vicinity of the roots. Nevertheless, the mobile system provides some improvements over existing systems.

My question is: Should we try to incorporate the mobile system in the same application or should we put it in a separate application? We consider the use of a mixture of water and liquid fertilizer, the construction of the grid and the method of positioning the grid to be the core of the invention. Basically, the only thing the mobile system has in common with this is the use of the mobile system for the delivery of the water/fertilizer mixture.

Thank you in advance for your thoughts/advice.


             

[patag2001]

Your comment "We consider the use of a mixture of water and liquid fertilizer, the construction of the grid and the method of positioning the grid to be the core of the invention".

Well, at least on the surface, this sounds like three inventions.

You can always file as one invention.  If there are multiple inventions, the PTO will ask you to make an election.  The non-elected inventions can be filed within the pendency of the elected invention to receive the same filing date.

[Patentstudent]

Your comment "We consider the use of a mixture of water and liquid fertilizer, the construction of the grid and the method of positioning the grid to be the core of the invention".

Well, at least on the surface, this sounds like three inventions.

You can always file as one invention.  If there are multiple inventions, the PTO will ask you to make an election.  The non-elected inventions can be filed within the pendency of the elected invention to receive the same filing date.

Thank you.
In the meantime, we are leaning towards filing two applications.

[fb]

In general, shouldn't the first independent claim be the core concept, for which nothing else can function without it?

Then, dependent claims can handle the other parts of the invention?

[Patentstudent]

What the two systems have in common is the fact that they use perforated tubing that supplies water sub-surface next to the roots of the grass. So, yes, you could centre the independent claim around this characteristic and then use separate dependent claims for the fixed system versus the mobile system.