Posts Tagged: "steve jobs"

Early on in his career with Apple, Steve Jobs conceived the idea of a personal computing device that a person could keep with them and use to connect wirelessly to other computer services. Almost 25 years later, Apple and Jobs would upend the world of personal computing by launching the iPhone smartphone, and a few years later a tablet computer counterpart, the iPad. According to the most recent sales figures available from Apple corporate analysis website AAPLinvestors.net, the iPhone has achieved lifetime sales of 590.5 million units; Apple has also sold 237.2 million iPads in just over three years since the release of that product. The iPhone has retained mass appeal despite the presence of the iPad and Apple has even reverted to soft launches for new iPad products, evidence of the incredible hold that the iPhone still maintains over Apple’s core consumer base. In the near future, both the iPhone and iPad may exhibit bendable or rollable displays using plastic OLED screen technologies developed by LG Electronics, one of the suppliers of electronic components for the iPhone and iPad.

In order to file an application or view outgoing correspondence online, the practitioner must authenticate using a private certificate and password. The process relies on an antiquated browser plugin, Java, that has not been welcomed into the new operating systems that power modern smartphones and tablets. As a result, mobile prosecution is possible only through a traditional operating system running on a laptop or netbook. To rectify the situation, the PTO will need to break its dependence on browser plugins and on the proprietary authentication system it has licensed from Entrust. Rather than license another proprietary system, the agency should follow WIPO’s example and adopt a standard certificate format compatible with modern browsers’ built-in authentication capabilities.

An exhibition showing the intellectual property (IP) behind Steve Jobs’ innovations opens to the public at WIPO on March 30, 2012 and will run through to World Intellectual Property Day on April 26, 2012. The exhibition ties in with this year’s World Intellectual Property Day theme – Visionary Innovators.

What’s troubling is that Hewlett Packard itself, the original startup headquartered in a garage, was one of the earliest and most-respected leaders of the 20th Century high-tech revolution that had its epicenter in Silicon Valley. It was William Hewlett who gave a 13-year-old Steve Jobs spare parts for a device Jobs was building — and a summer job as well. And it was Mr. Hewlett and his executive heirs who insisted that HP conscientiously patent its breakthrough innovations and fight against those that infringed those patents. HP today earns hundreds of millions of dollars annually by licensing its patent rights to others — according to IAM magazine, “at any one time, HP has about 150 licensing transactions in process.” And as the court dockets show, it certainly isn’t shy about filing suit against infringers who refuse to take a license.

In celebration of its mission to recognize and foster invention, the National Inventors Hall of Fame has announced its 2012 Inductees. The inventors to be honored this year created remarkable innovations that include the now ubiquitous laser printer commonly found in the workplace, the thin-film head technology that has contributed to the success of the disk drive industry, and the first statin which pioneered the class of drugs targeted at lowering cholesterol.

Steve Jobs, the visionary founder and leader of Apple Computer Corporation, died Wednesday, October 5, 2011 at the age of 56 after an 8-year battle with a rare form of pancreatic cancer. Jobs, who is sometimes referred to as the father of personal computing, was the mastermind behind Apple’s Computers, iPods, iPhones, iMacs and iPad’s and is seen by many as a man who pioneered the personal computing industry and literally changed the way we live our lives every day. In celebration of his life and his accomplishments over the years, the following is a timeline of Jobs’ history, and the history of Apple, beginning in 1972 when he graduated from High School in Palo Alto, CA, and focusing on the major events in a memorable life.

Having a small business means having many challenges, especially in the earliest phases of development. Faced with challenges such as letting people know about your new business, establishing and augmenting your brand, creating a website, designing logos, developing and implementing marketing initiatives, creating and printing real world marketing materials, procuring new clients and customers, building and maintaining a blog, initiating and executing a social media campaign, acquiring followers within your social media platforms, securing office space at a reasonable cost, book keeping and everything else that must be done during the start-up process. This seemingly endless list of tasks seems to imply that starting a new business will most certainly be a stressful and very expensive endeavor. But starting and growing a small business, does not have to cost you an arm and a leg nor does having a small business mean that your business has to look “Small.”

The log jam in patents issuances is not the only impediment to start-up job creation. Although it is certainly a big one. Tax and regulatory burdens on start ups have reached a critical mass in the last 10 years. A fact recognized by President Obama when he signed an Executive order last Tuesday ordering the removal of burdensome regulatory rules on business. Also a problem are the post 9-11 immigration policies that are driving many of the world’s best and brightest scientists and engineers to other countries. But the biggest job killer beside the patent backlog is the systemic destruction of our high tech manufacturing capacity.

On March 2, 2010, Apple filed two lawsuits against High Tech Computer Corp. (aka HTC Corp.), HTC (B.V.I.) Corp, HTC America, Inc. and Exeda, Inc in the US District Court for the District of Delaware, and a concurrent ITC proceeding. Speculation has already started to rise, not surprisingly, that the real target of Apple is none other than Google, who is the creator of the Android operating system that seems to be the foundation of the allegedly infringing technologies. Given that Apple has sold over 40 million iPhones worldwide, if they do believe there is infringement they can hardly let Google muscle in on this lucrative technology turf.