Legal Terms

anticipation

In patent law, a situation in which an invention is "anticipated" by being too similar to an earlier invention to be considered novel. Because novelty is a requirement for a patent, anticipated inventions are not patentable. Anticipation can occur when a prior invention or printed publication matches all of the primary characteristics of the invention, or it can happen when the invention is displayed or offered for sale more than a year prior to filing a patent application. For example, a bird owner invents a device to keep her bird from picking at its tail feathers. She applies for a patent, but her application is rejected on the ground that the same device was in use 3500 years ago in Egypt. In patent-speak, the inventor's creation has been anticipated by previous developments (the prior art.)