PATENT REJECTED!13 May 2014 16:16
Hi
I have followed this site for a while, and have held PIM shares for a long time, and although I divested most of them a while back I still keep tabs on them. I am a strong believer in keeping informed investments, even if this means discussing poor performance or negative news. It helps nobody just ignoring bad news, and talking things up constantly.
This week has seen catastrophic news for PIM regarding the patent application for the technology that constitutes all their current sales Inca/Veritas/Amestros/Cat etc. See link below:
hxxps://register.epo.org/application?lng=en&number=EP06744220&tab=doclist
It seems that the EPO has completely rejected all the new claims PIM tried to add to their patent a couple of years back. PIM at the time claimed the original patent claims 'failed to protect the essence of the invention'. Worse still for PIM the EPO have also reiterated that they will reject the original claims as well leaving no patent protection at all, even the claims PIM state were inadequate.
They now have four months to submit weaker claims, and hope they are passed. Reading the reports from the EPO it doesn't look good for their chances. I guess this could affect sales, likelihood of attracting partners, retention of partners, and ultimately share value.
Discuss.