Diverse Patent Portfolio for 3M: Digital Sticky Notes, Dental Innovations and Monitoring Criminal Offenders

Headquartered in St. Paul, MN, the 3M Company (NYSE: MMM) is a major American corporation involved with the development of a wide range of consumer personal care products as well as medical systems, vehicle care and other industries; it’s also a member of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The company recently passed an important valuation milestone as it saw its total worth push past $100 billion in early November; the company expects to finish the year with a record $31 billion in sales. In financial publications, some investing commentators have discussed 3M as a fairly safe core portfolio investment, although the company is not expected to greatly outperform others in its sector over the next year. The company has invested itself heavily in corporate expansions, including the recent announcement of a $57.6 million high-tech medical supply manufacturing facility in Brookings, SD.

The Companies We Follow series has been busy reviewing the R&D activities of some corporations which we haven’t featured before, and today we have the intellectual property development activities of 3M in our sights. Patent applications assigned to this company which have been filed with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office disclose a number of unique chemical compositions, including an anti-fogging compound for better visibility through vehicle windows. A couple of electronic data systems are also disclosed, including one designed to enable community monitoring of local criminal offenders.

3M has a very strong patent portfolio and the past few weeks saw the addition of many intriguing technologies to its IP holdings. A couple of patents protect improvements to orthodontics and dental treatment, including a system designed for better digital modeling of interior mouth structures. Another more general medical innovation involves the use of a nylon article including a dye that provides antimicrobial properties when light passes through the dye. We also discuss a self-priming wall spackle compound and a software system for the digital management of sticky notes, such as Post-it notes.

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3M’s Patent Applications: From Anti-Fogging Windows to Community Monitoring of Criminal Offenders

The 3M Company has a very proud history of innovative development in an array of consumer products that has been supported by the corporation since the early days of its founding in 1902. Currently, 3M supports a network of 30 Innovation Centers of Technical Excellence; most of these are in Southeast Asia, Europe and the United States, but there are facilities in India, Australia, South Africa and South America. Investment by 3M into research and development activities should be increasing from 5.5 percent of sales in 2012 to 6 percent of sales by the year 2017.

A trio of patent applications filed by 3M in recent months caught our eyes because of the intriguing chemical substances they would protect. Most of these are intended to be incorporated into a variety of the consumer products developed for daily use in the home, such as is the case with U.S. Patent Application No. 20140329012, filed under the title Cleanable Articles and Methods for Making and Using Same. This patent application would protect a method of making a cleanable article having a front surface coated with an overcoat having a siloxane-bondable component; the overcoat is cured to create a hydrophilic overcoat with a glossy matte surface. This method is intended for use in the creation of dry erase writing boards with improved cleanability and lower ghosting properties. Home exteriors may also see improvements in aesthetics through the compound protected by U.S. Patent Application No. 20140303305, entitled Composition and Method for Providing Stain Release or Stain Repellency to Substrates. This patent application claims the use of a composition for providing stain release or repellence properties to natural or man-made stone; the composition is comprised of a fluorinated compound, a potassium or lithium silicate and an acrylic polymer. This substance is formulated to reduce the vulnerability to soiling of granite, concrete and other stone materials which are both hard and porous and used as building materials for home exteriors. Another chemical compound developed by 3M serves as a useful treatment for windows and other surfaces and is expressed within U.S. Patent Application No. 20140335360, titled Anti-Fog Coating Comprising Aqueous Polymeric Dispersion, Crosslinker & Surfactant. The anti-fog coating composition claimed by this patent application is comprised of an aqueous polymeric dispersion, an aziridine crosslinker and a polyalkylene oxide surfactant. When cured to a surface, the coating composition exhibits no fogging within eight seconds after being soaked in 25°C water for an hour. This composition can be applied to a range of transparent or translucent substrates, including vehicle windshields, protective eyewear or traffic signs, to keep humidity and temperature differences from causing a fogging effect.

3M’s R&D activities into chemical engineering has even brought the company into the realm of alternative energy fuel development, which we saw evidenced in U.S. Patent Application No. 20140349357, which is titled Methods of Producing Butanol from Non-Cellulosic Biomass. This patent application would protect a method of producing butanol through fermentation of an aqueous solution containing carbohydrates from non-cellulosic biomass using multiple fermentation broths containing different levels of butanol. The invention is designed to improve the derivation of butanol, used as a building block chemical and as a fuel, from biomass and increase butanol production rates by a factor of two.

From U.S. Patent Application No. 20140330587, titled “Medical Diagnosis Derived from Patient Drug History Data.”

A couple of medical innovations were featured by patent applications that caught our eyes during our recent survey of 3M technologies, including one that brings us away from chemical engineering and towards the company’s developments in electronic systems. The delivery of a variety of medications to patients will be improved thanks to the innovation described within U.S. Patent Application No. 20140309314, filed under the title Polymeric Particles for Storage and Delivery of Active Agents. The reaction mixture claimed by this patent application is comprised of a polysaccharide dissolved in water as well as a dispersed phase containing hydrophobic monomers. The polymeric particles of this invention are optimal for the adsorption of biologically active agents such as antimicrobial agents, local anaesthetics, skin tightening agents, sunscreen agents, herbicides, insecticides and much more. A computing system for aiding the diagnosis of patients in medical contexts is the focus of U.S. Patent Application No. 20140330587, which is titled Medical Diagnosis Derived from Patient Drug History Data. This patent application claims a computer-implemented method of receiving a patient’s drug history, analyzing patient data to determine a relationship between drug usage and a disease and determining a hierarchy of diseases that could impact a patient’s health. This system is designed to improve the ability of medical professionals to derive a medically relevant diagnosis while taking into account the risk factors of taking medications in such a way that can predict treatment costs.

From U.S. Pat. App. No. 20140344404, “Released Offender Geospatial Location Information User Application.”

Finally, we were greatly intrigued to learn of a public information service developed by 3M to help members of a community stay aware of the location of criminals living in their neighborhood. U.S. Patent Application No. 20140344404, which is titled Released Offender Geospatial Location Information User Application, would protect an application for a mobile or fixed device which interfaces with a clearinghouse for geospatial information regarding criminal offenders. This innovation enables community monitoring of criminal offenders living in an area in such a way that information about a criminal’s residence or tendencies to frequent a specific address can be updated by those outside of law enforcement. The system would also enable users to submit panic alerts or make calls to an emergency dispatch center.

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Issued Patents of Note: Plenty of Medical Innovations, Digital Post-it Notes and Self-Priming Wall Spackle 

The patenting activities being handled by the 3M Company are fairly strong; during 2013, 3M Innovative Properties, the company’s main intellectual property subsidiary, placed 73rd globally with a total of 532 patents awarded by the USPTO that year. In May of this year, 3M announced that it had amassed 100,000 patents in its intellectual property portfolio, although many of these are coming from offices other than the USPTO. This incredible strength in IP has led some to speculate that the company could do a better job monetizing its own R&D, especially in the fields of smartphone and healthcare technology.

From U.S. Patent No. 8897902, titled “Orthodontic Digital Setups.”

Medical innovations were again the focus of a number of technologies developed by 3M, including a couple of products developed to improve dental health in patients. Improved diagnostic procedures involving the analysis of a patient’s teeth are disclosed and protected by U.S. Patent No. 8897902, issued under the title Orthodontic Digital Setups, claims a computer-implemented method for recognizing the gingival margin of a tooth by receiving surface model data that defines the three-dimensional surface of a mouth. This invention is configured to enable better segmentation of a patient’s teeth, gingival tissue and other surrounding oral structures for the improvement of orthodontic diagnosis and treatment. Improvements to medical procedures involving dental replacements is the focus of U.S. Patent No. 8882502, which is titled Device and a Method for Delivery of a Dental Composition. This patent protects a device used for retracting a gingiva, or a layer of gums, from a tooth by using a dental composition to widen a gingival sulcus, or the space between the tooth and gums. Gingival retraction procedures are often used in dental restoration periods and this invention provides a gingival retraction device that is low-cost, easy to use and creates few side or after effects.

We also wanted to share a couple of patents protecting innovations with practical applications in other medical fields beyond orthodontics and dentistry. A fabric material that can deliver antimicrobial activity when irradiated with light is disclosed by U.S. Patent No. 8877125, entitled Light-Activated Antimicrobial Articles and Methods of Use. This patent claims a light-activated antimicrobial article which consists of an acridine dye covalently bonded to a nylon material. When the acridine dye absorbs light, colony forming units of a microorganism exposed to the article decrease from about 90 percent to 99.99 percent. This invention supports the use of a nylon article for inclusion in a medical kit to destroy bacteria and viruses though a photodynamic effect implemented by photosensitizers. The production of medical devices which can help medications and other treatments reach their targets more effectively is protected by U.S. Patent No. 8858807, entitled Process for Making Microneedles, Microneedle Arrays, Masters, and Replication Tools. This innovative technique was developed to improve the manufacture of super-fine microneedles used to pierce skin structures to pass through therapeutic agents. The patent claims a process of preparing microneedles that involves providing a photoreactive composition and exposing the composition to enough light to cause the absorption of two photons to induce an acid- or radical-initiated chemical reaction.

From U.S. Patent No. 8891862, titled “Note Recognition and Management Using Color Classification.”

3M has developed many consumer products which have achieved a nearly mythic stature in our consumer culture, such as the Post-it note. A technology designed to support digital representation of these sticky notes is at the center of U.S. Patent No. 8891862, which is titled Note Recognition and Management Using Color Classification. This patent claims a method of extracting note content using a computer system that involves receiving image data of a scene having a plurality of notes and generating a plurality of indicators which correspond with different color classes. This innovation is intended to bridge the gap between the actual real-world use of physical Post-it notes with digital tools configured to improve management of those notes.

We’ll close our survey of 3M’s recently patented technologies with a look at a patent issued to the company in early November which is directed at an improved putty used for wall repair procedures. U.S. Patent No. 8877840, issued under the title Self Priming Spackling Compound, protects a spackling compound which is mainly composed of an acrylic latex resin which has a particle size of less than about 0.18 microns; the compound also includes a filler material and water. The spackling compound of this invention achieves a more consistent and uniform appearance when applied to a wall without the need for priming, reducing the risk of a glossy finish on the wall if the priming is performed incorrectly.

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