The Obviousness of Similar Patents Regarding Sleeving Systems

Obviousness in the patent world means that a person having ordinary skills in that respective art would not have easily thought of an idea given the plurality of the prior art. In my opinion, the following patents are all very similar. I did notice that the authors of the patents included specific rhetoric to differentiate their particular patents as original ideas. Despite their similarity, one can argue that the changes of the patents are incremental improvements rather than peculiarly insignificant changes for the sake of having different patents that allow the respective inventors the ability to manufacture these goods without the need of licensing from previous inventors’ patent ideas.

The first time that the idea of a thermal-beverage-related patent was established was 1948 with the thermal coffee cup. Here, Delbert Phinney described his patent as a hand-held container that was adapted to withhold hot substances.

From there, the idea was restructured by James Arthur Rule who patented the sleeve construction for improved paperboard cup insulation in November of 2000. His idea differed from Phinney’s in that his protective sleeves had hot-melt glue dots that improved the insulating abilities of the paperboard cup.

Following Rule’s improvement, Liming Cai created a patent for the insulating sleeve in 2002. Cai’s patent further describes the abilities of the “insulating” sleeve, as it could be used for both hot and cold beverages, as well as paperboard and non-paper cups.

Although John Katchko et al filed a patent for the thermal sleeve, Method for manufacturing a thermal sleeve and combination cup and thermal sleeve in 2005, their patent was not issues until 2012. Their patent goes into depth in describing what the thermal sleeve is composed of: it has top and bottom openings that allow the cup to go through the sleeve; an inner, creped paper lining; and an adhesive holding that rings the sleeve around the cup.

In 2007, three different patents applications were filed regarding the thermal sleeves: all three were patented.

In March of 2007, Kevin Prince patented the insulator sleeve for a beverage container, which is distinguished by its disposable nature and ability to be used repeatedly. Moreover, these sleeves could be made of biodegradable materials, so as to leave less of a negative impact on the environment through the manufacturing of said product. Unlike previous patents, this one describes the different types of cups, such as the frusto-conical beverage cup, and sleeves, like the transparent or disposable sleeves, that are a part of the patent. His idea was patented in April 2011.

In December of 2007, Wendy and Donald LaGuardia filed the patent for the temperature-indicating sleeve and related container. What distinguishes this sleeve from the rest is that it has a temperature indicator on the sleeve, which improves the customer’s interaction with very hot or cold beverage containers. The LaGuardia’s idea was patented on February 21^st of 2012.

In August of 2007, Andrew Raymond Spriegel et al filed the beverage cup sleeving system and method. This contraption is differs from the previous patents in that the sleeve is elastomeric and manufactured with a liquid crystal that changes color with temperature fluctuations. Published in 2008, this idea was patented far quicker than the previous two inventions. It was probably easier for the USPTO to patent this idea because of the addition of crystal liquid to the sleeve, as this clearly distinction the idea from the others, whereas the other two patent files may have required more editing and research in order to be differentiated enough to become new patents.

In 2009, the protective sleeve’s patent application was filed. Unlike former designs of thermal sleeves, this protective sleeve has one or more arch-like shapes; this arch-like shape is said to improve the efficiency of the material used in manufacturing these sleeves and decrease the environmental waste emitted through the sleeves’ manufacturing process. Barry Silverstein et al patented this protective sleeve in January of 2010. The efficiency that the change in shape brought to the thermal sleeve was probably a clear improvement of previous sleeve patents, which is why this application was published in less than a year.

The last patent application was filed in February, 2014 by Eugene Chun. His patent is the hot and cold, disposable cup sleeve with water-absorbent lining, a water-repellent outer layer, and a coating laminate layer that is bound to the outer layer. This outer layer is made up of polypropylene, polyethylene, polyethylene terephthalate, viscous rayon, acrylic, aramid, and nylon and is enclosed to provide a safe and comfortable.

Published in June of 2014, the patent was probably published in such a quick manner because it was easily distinguished by the thorough description of the lining and outer layer.