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To: straight life who wrote (13502)	8/9/1998 8:30:00 PM
From: Jon Koplik	Respond to of 152472

To all - (very) O.T., but, it is the weekend ... August 9, 1998 13-Year-Old Gets Patent for Shelves A.P. INDEXES: TOP STORIES \| NEWS \| SPORTS \| BUSINESS \| TECHNOLOGY \| ENTERTAINMENT Filed at 8:02 p.m. EDT By The Associated Press CLIFTON, Va. (AP) -- The plastic shelves Rachel Kurtis and her fifth-grade friends bought for their lockers crumbled under the weight of books and were tricky to put together, so Rachel invented a sturdier, pre-assembled set. The project got her an A on her Invention Convention assignment. It also got her patent number 5746331. Rachel, now a veteran of the entrepreneurial process at age 13, received her patent in June. It gives the girl exclusive rights to manufacture and sell her shelves in any size and with any material for the next 20 years. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office does not keep statistics on the ages of inventors, but receiving one is hardly a given, even for adults. Only 124,000 patents were granted last year, compared with 232,000 applied for. Five of Rachel's young friends already bought sets for $20 apiece, and her older brother got one free, but she didn't do any marketing while waiting for the patent. ''Now, I'm probably going to blab,'' she said, thinking about the 400 potential buyers among her fellow students at Flint Hill School. It takes about three hours for Rachel to make one set of the shelves, which fold up and are held in place by what she calls a ''stop bar.'' She plans to stockpile them this summer. To sell beyond the school, she may need some help. A manufacturing company has already sent a letter offering their services, said Rhonda Kurtis, Rachel's mother. ''The next step, we're really not sure,'' said Mrs. Kurtis, who was wary of the offer. Rachel may apply for a trademark on the name ''Lockerpal,'' which is what she called the shelves for her class project. The family will have to sell quite a few shelves to earn back what the patent cost in application and attorney's fees. Patent attorney Anthony Venturio said it can take four years and an average of $10,000 to successfully stake a claim on an original invention. It took 16 months and less than $5,000 for Rachel to get her patent, said Mrs. Kurtis. ''Sometimes the simpler the better,'' Venturio said. Rachel's parents are both lawyers but knew nothing about patents before they started asking around for a patent attorney. They paid $300 for a quick search to see if it was worth continuing. The filing fee was $385 and they paid another $660 when the patent was issued. The Kurtises also paid for required drawings and fees for two amendments, as well as legal fees. Venturio said most patents are denied during the first application and many are denied during a second. ''That's when the battle begins,'' he said. Rejection does not necessarily mean the invention isn't original, but the written description of its function may not suit the examiner, he said. Mrs. Kurtis said Rachel holds the first patent in the family. The only hint of her talent was an early love of jigsaw puzzles. She plays piano, saxophone and three sports and doesn't spend much time with computers. And if Rachel is thinking about another invention, she's smart enough not to blab about it to a reporter.