This document provides an overview of careers in electrical engineering and patent law. It discusses that electrical engineering is a difficult but respected college major, and that math and communication skills are important. It then summarizes that patent law requires 7 years of education, and that patent prosecutors work independently on small projects while patent litigators work on long-term, high-stakes cases. It closes by giving an example of analyzing whether Apple's slide to unlock patent is obvious given prior touchscreen unlock technologies.

1. Careers in Electrical
Engineering and Patent Law
a brief overview for high school students

2. Overview
- Discussion of Electrical Engineering careers
- Discussion of Patent Law careers
- Discussion of a typical patent law issue
- Inventor/Entrepreneur story
- Questions?

3. - Engineering is a highly respected college major. Electrical and chemical
engineering are generally considered the most difficult engineering degrees.
- Therefore, if you don’t know what you want to study but you want to make
effective use of your time and money at college consider electrical or
chemical engineering. A lot of non-engineering doors will remain open for
you.
- Math is the key to doing well as a student of engineering.
- Writing/communication skills are the key to doing well in your career.
Electrical Engineering

4. Patent Law
- Of the about 1 million attorneys in the U.S. about 2% of them do what I do,
which is “patent prosecution,” i.e., obtain patents for clients.
- Another 6% do “patent litigation,” i.e., enforce patents for clients, or “patent
licensing,” negotiate exchange of patent rights.
- Requires bachelor’s degree (4 years) and law degree (3 years).
- Most patent lawyers work for at least a few years at a law firm to get some
training from experts in the field.
- Patent patent prosecutors generally tend to be more introverted.
- Patent litigators and licensors generally tend to be more extroverted.

5. - Your bachelor’s degree must be in science or engineering.
- You must be good at mental work and writing effectively.
- You focus on a very small set of legal issues (e.g., whether an invention is obvious) but
you are exposed to a lot of engineering issues and technologies.
- You work independently on almost everything with a high degree of control over your
work.
- Work is very steady, can be predictable.
- You mostly work on relatively small projects, usually several different cases per day,
rarely more than a week is spent on a single case or issue.
Patent Prosecution

6. - You don’t need to have an engineering background but it certainly helps.
- Arguing in court is relatively rare. You spend most of the time analyzing
issues, writing, and discussing strategies with clients/colleagues.
- You have little control of your schedule or workload.
- You typically work on big, long-term projects that can last from a few months
to a few years.
- Your wins are very exciting. Your losses can be very depressing.
Patent Litigation

7. Typical Patent Law Issue - Obviousness
Is Apple’s Slide to Unlock Patent (US 8,046,721) obvious?

8. Nokia’s “touch” to unlock phone
FIG. 3B shows the touch screen 320 of a device, predetermined
contact areas 300, 302, 304, 306, 308 outlined with broken lines,
and images 312, 314, 316, 318 visible on the touch screen. The
different figures 312, 314, 316, 318 or photos shown on the touch
screen facilitate the remembering of personal predetermined contact
areas. To deactivate the touch screen 320 lock of the terminal, a
reset area 300, for example, is first touched. The next
predetermined contact areas to be touched are, for example,
302,304, 306 and 308. The user has used the user interface of the
device to specify in advance that the first contact area 302 to be
touched is at the square figure 316, the second contact area 304 is
at the ball-like figure 312, the third contact area 306 is at
anotherball-like figure 314 and the contact area 308 to be touched
last is at an arm 319of the star-like figure 318.

9. Swatch’s slide to input security code watch
In FIG. 4 b the possibility is provided to enter a security code which only contains two digits or numbers, e.g. the digits 4 and 9. The
finger is firstly placed on the first reference of the key representing the digit 4. From this first reference the finger can be moved over
several possible trajectories to reach the second reference of the key representing the digit 9.

10. Apple’s slide to unlock patent claim
7. A portable electronic device, comprising:
a touch-sensitive display;
memory;
one or more processors; and
one or more modules stored in the memory and configured for execution by the one or more processors, the one or more modules including
instructions:
to detect a contact with the touch-sensitive display at a first predefined location corresponding to an unlock image;
to continuously move the unlock image on the touch-sensitive display in accordance with movement of the detected contact while continuous
contact with the touch-sensitive display is maintained, wherein the unlock image is a graphical, interactive user-interface object with which a
user interacts in order to unlock the device; and
to unlock the hand-held electronic device if the unlock image is moved from the first predefined location on the touch screen to a predefined
unlock region on the touch-sensitive display.

11. More prior art found by Samsung in litigation
Neonode phones had a primitive slide to unlock feature before Apple’s patent filing

12. Plaisant prior art
Catherine Plaisant, a research scientist, described touch screens with sliding
toggle switches in 1992.

13. Spin Pop and Spin Brush inventor
- John Osher had success in 1996 with the Spin Pop
lollipop.
- In 1997 he went on to develop the Spin Brush
toothbrush with a $1.5 million investment.
- He sold it to Crest for $500 million 4 years later.
- http://www.allbusiness.com/the-man-the-legend-john-osher-inventor-of-the-spin-brush-part-i-2-7665547-1.html
- http://www.allbusiness.com/the-man-the-legend-john-osher-inventor-of-the-spin-brush-part-ii-2-7665600-1.html

14. Any Questions
?