Intellectual Property

​Costs vary depending on what you’re protecting and how complex it is. It helps to think about three phases of an IP asset’s lifecycle: (1) application preparation and filing, (2) prosecution (the back-and-forth with the examining office after filing), and (3) allowance and maintenance.

Filing fees are set by the government agency that processes your application — the US Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO) for patents and trademarks, or the US Copyright Office for copyrights. For example, the base trademark application fee is currently $350 per class, though surcharges may apply if information is missing or if you use a custom goods and services description. These fees are set by the government and subject to change.

Once an application is filed, it enters prosecution — the process of communicating with the examining office to address any objections or rejections and work toward approval. This can take anywhere from several months to a few years, depending on the type of IP and the complexity of the application. The government charges additional fees, such as fees to request extensions. After approval, maintaining your IP rights requires periodic maintenance fees and, for trademarks, proof of continued use. Failing to meet these deadlines can result in losing your rights.

Attorney fees are separate and vary widely depending on the type of IP and complexity of your matter. Romano Law offers flat-rate structures at each step to make budgeting more predictable

For trademarks, you can search the USPTO’s online database, TESS (Trademark Electronic Search System), to look for registered marks. For patents, the USPTO’s Patent Public Search allows you to search issued patents and published applications. Both tools are publicly available at uspto.gov. Google Patents is also a valuable tool.

However, the USPTO databases are not the only place to look. Trademark rights can arise from use alone, even without federal registration, meaning unregistered marks won’t appear in the USPTO database, but can still pose a conflict. A thorough trademark search also covers state registrations, common law uses, domain names, and other sources. For patents, relevant prior art can exist in foreign patent databases, academic publications, technical literature, and other public disclosures that may not appear in a USPTO search.

Interpreting the results also requires legal judgment. For trademarks, the question isn’t just whether an identical mark exists — the USPTO will refuse registration if there is a likelihood of confusion with an existing mark based on similar appearance, sound, meaning, or the relatedness of the goods and services. For patents, the analysis turns on whether your invention is anticipated or rendered obvious by existing prior art. And even if your path to registration looks clear, that doesn’t necessarily mean you’re free to use the mark or invention without infringing someone else’s rights. Registration and freedom to operate are separate questions.

For these reasons, a formal search and analysis before filing is strongly recommended—especially for patents, which require substantially more investment over time than trademarks. A professional search can help identify potential obstacles early, help you assess your chances of success, and avoid investing in an application that is likely to face rejection.

The right time to file depends on the type of IP involved and your business goals — but in general, earlier is better.

Trademarks

You don’t need to register a trademark to use it. Common law rights arise automatically from use of a mark in commerce, and you can use the ™ symbol without any registration. However, federal registration with the USPTO offers significant advantages: it creates a legal presumption of ownership and exclusive right to use the mark nationwide, entitles you to use the ® symbol, provides a basis for blocking infringing imports, and makes it easier to enforce your rights in court. If you’re serious about your brand, filing sooner rather than later helps establish priority and protects against others who may adopt a similar mark.

Patents

Timing is especially critical. In the United States, you have a one-year grace period to file a patent application after publicly disclosing your invention — through a sale, publication, public use, or other disclosure. However, this grace period is unique to the US. In most other countries, any public disclosure before filing destroys the right to patent protection entirely. If international protection matters to your business, you should file before any public disclosure. Even domestically, waiting until the last minute under the grace period creates unnecessary risk. In general, you should file as early as your invention is sufficiently developed to describe and claim. If you have filed a provisional patent, you have one year to file the utility patent to keep the same priority date.

Copyrights

Copyright protection arises automatically when an original work is created and fixed in a tangible form — registration is not required. That said, registering with the US Copyright Office before infringement occurs (or within three months of publication) unlocks important benefits, including the ability to sue for statutory damages and attorney’s fees, which can make enforcement far more practical and cost-effective. Since the Supreme Court’s 2019 decision in Fourth Estate Public Benefit Corp. v. Wall-Street.com, registration is a prerequisite to filing a copyright infringement suit nationwide.

As a general rule, the best time to consult an IP attorney is before you go public with your product, brand, or creative work — not after.

IP approval grants you exclusive rights — but the scope and duration of those rights vary by type.

Patents

A granted patent gives you a legal monopoly over your invention. You have the right to exclude others from making, using, selling, offering for sale, or importing the patented invention in the United States for the life of the patent. This exclusivity is powerful, but it is defined and limited by the specific language drafted during prosecution. A patent does not automatically give you the right to practice your own invention or “freedom to operate” — for example, your invention may incorporate technology covered by someone else’s patent. In those cases, you need permission from the other patent owner.

Trademarks

Registration gives you the exclusive right to use your mark in connection with the goods and services identified in your registration, and the legal tools to stop others from using confusingly similar marks in commerce. Unlike patents, trademark rights can last indefinitely as long as the mark remains in use and required maintenance filings are made. A federally registered mark also carries a legal presumption of validity and nationwide priority, which significantly strengthens your position in any dispute.

Even without a federal registration — or any registration at all — businesses are never free to deceive or confuse consumers. The Lanham Act and various state consumer protection laws prohibit unfair competition, false designation of origin, and other deceptive practices regardless of whether a mark is registered. This means that even without a federal trademark registration, you may have actionable rights if someone is trading on your brand’s reputation or misleading consumers about the source of their goods or services. Registration, however, makes those rights significantly easier and less costly to enforce.

Copyrights

Registration confirms your exclusive rights to reproduce, distribute, display, perform, and create derivative works from your original work. Copyright protection generally lasts for the life of the author plus 70 years. Because copyright is rooted in the US Constitution and governed exclusively by federal law, copyright infringement claims can only be heard in federal court — state courts have no jurisdiction over copyright claims.

As noted above, registration is required before you can file suit. The timing of that registration also determines what remedies are available to you. If you registered before the infringement occurred — or within three months of first publication — you can seek statutory damages and attorney’s fees, which provide a meaningful basis for enforcement even when actual harm is difficult to quantify. If you wait until after infringement has already occurred, you can still register and file suit, but you will be limited to actual damages, meaning you’ll need to prove concrete financial harm. Actual damages can be difficult to establish and may not justify the cost of federal litigation, which is one of the most practical reasons to register early.

Across all types of IP, approval is not the end of the story. Rights must be actively monitored and enforced — no government agency will police infringement on your behalf. The strength of your rights will always depend in part on how carefully your application was prepared and prosecuted.