Inventor Stories: RISEing with Patents

In this month’s special episode, we’re sharing a great sit down with three very innovative, up-and-coming inventors – as we also launch the next installment of our RISE award. 

We are joined today by:
⦿ Keith Phillips, CEO & Founder of realLINGUA
⦿ Theresa Smith, CTO of the Ola Filter Corporation
⦿ Brendan Wang, Founder of CAPNOS

These inventors share their stories and provide invaluable tips and advice, much learned the hard way. Along the way, we explore:
⦿ Challenges in bootstrapping – especially as companies coming up through the pandemic
⦿ The importance of patenting and how the RISE award helped solve critical challenges
⦿ Advice for inventors new to patenting
⦿ The  importance of feedback

** Learn more and apply for the RISE award ** 

The RISE award offers a free provisional U.S. patent application or $5,000 towards a non-provisional U.S. patent application to a selected applicant.
https://www.aurorapatents.com/rise-up-with-aurora.html

** Learn more about our featured inventors ** 

⦿ Keith Phillips and realLINGUA: https://reallingua.com
⦿ Theresa Smith and the Ola Filter: https://www.olafilter.com
⦿ Brendan Wang and The CAPNOS Zero®: https://mycapnos.com

** Resources **

⦿ Show Notes: https://www.aurorapatents.com/blog/new-podcast-inventor-stories-vol-1

** Follow Aurora Consulting **

⦿ Home: https://www.aurorapatents.com/

⦿ Twitter: https://twitter.com/AuroraPatents

⦿ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/aurora-cg/

⦿ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/aurorapatents/

⦿ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/aurorapatents/ 

And as always, thanks for listening! 

---
Note: The contents of this podcast do not constitute legal advice.

Chapters

• 0:00 Intro
• 0:30 RISE Award
• 3:10 Meet Brendan Wang, Founder of CAPNOS
• 3:59 Meet Theresa Smith, CTO of the Ola Filter Corporation
• 5:26 Meet Keith Phillips, CEO & Founder of realLINGUA
• 9:56 Biggest challenges in bootstrapping
• 20:08 How the RISE award helped and importance of patenting
• 21:54 Protecting your idea before disclosing and seeking funding
• 22:51 Patent evolution through product iteration
• 23:34 Discovering differentiators through patenting
• 25:24 Advice for inventors new to patenting
• 25:42 Cost savings through DIY patenting and when to get help
• 29:02 Patent searching and understanding how to protect the value you're providing
• 30:02 Taking good notes and filing provisionals early
• 32:53 Seeing the competitive landscape through patenting
• 34:44 Honing your story
• 35:50 Value of feedback
• 37:00 Marketing challenges
• 37:44 Using feedback to discover new market segments
• 41:42 Iteration and re-inventing your company
• 44:10 Lessons learned from smartest and dumbest steps
• 45:36 What kind of company are we building?
• 47:05 Seeking help
• 50:55 Taking the leap
• 53:43 Company updates
• 59:07 How to apply for RISE
• 59:55 Outro

Transcript

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Good day and welcome to the Patently Strategic Podcast, where we discuss all things at

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the intersection of business, technology and patents. This podcast is

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a monthly discussion amongst experts in the field of patenting. It is for

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inventors, founders and and IP professionals alike, established or

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aspiring. And in this month's episode, we're changing up the format

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a bit and we'll be sharing a great sitdown with three very innovative upandcoming

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inventors as we also launch the next installment of our Rise

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Award. To set the table for this conversation, we're going to travel

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way back in time to early 2020. It's the height of the pandemic,

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and like everyone else, we're desperately trying to one make sense of all

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of it and to figure out what we could possibly do to help.

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The stock market was tanking and private capital tends to have

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a strongly correlated long tail. A lot of the companies in the space we

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work with are pre revenue, so this sounded like a good place to focus.

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All the VCs we were talking to were saying the same thing. Extend the runway.

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Extend the runway. Well, how exactly do you do that? You focus

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efforts, make cuts, et cetera. But it's impossible to pull

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resources and money out of thin air. Or is it?

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And that's when we got the idea to do Rise. In a time

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of fighting for survival, we knew that many companies would

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risk their IP strategy. But we strongly felt that weathering

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this crisis should not come at the loss of hard fought R amp

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D efforts. So we came up with the Relief for Innovative Startup Endurance,

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or Rise Award to help you selected startups extend their runway

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by helping them freely secure a provisional patent. The response was overwhelming.

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The stories broke our hearts, and the tales of perseverance inspired us.

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So much so that we decided that the original plan for a single

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award wasn't enough under the circumstances and ended up extending

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awards to four recipients in 2020.

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Given how incredibly rewarding the entire experience was, and given the

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problems that still plagued our world even a year later, we decided to bring

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Rise back in 2021. Going forward this year and beyond,

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we intend for this to be an annual fixture. We love helping entrepreneurs.

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It's what gets us out of bed in the morning. However, out of

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a strong desire to look forward beyond this pandemic,

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we're rebranding Rise as the Recognition for Innovative Startup

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Excellence Award. Okay, so back to present day.

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We've been kicking around the idea of incorporating adventure stories into a new occasional

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episode format, so the timing really seems perfect to bring these two

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worlds together. Today we are sitting down and chatting with some of our

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favorite inventors, all past recipients of the Rise Award. Three really

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great companies made up of wonderful humans, all looking to make

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a big difference. Be sure to stick around after the interviews

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for details on how to apply for this year's Rise Award. So without further Ado,

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let's meet our guests. All right. Thanks, everybody, for joining today.

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And so to kind of do this commemorative the first

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Rise of Kind of History podcast. And so

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I'd love for you all to tell a little bit about your company, yourselves and

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your invention and kind of what led you to focus on the problem that you

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did. Certainly, I can start off and maybe we can just popcorn it

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around. Sounds great. All right. So Hi there, everyone.

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My name is Brendan Wong. I first started vaping when

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I was in high school, and I struggled with my addiction for over five years.

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And as a teenager, it was really frustrating to me that there weren't so many

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options available to help address the behavioral addiction component.

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So as a sophomore in College at Michigan State University, I've invented the Captain

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Zero. It's a flavored pressurized air inhaler

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that works like so use as a behavioral

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inhaler. It's just flavored pressurized air.

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And we've already been helping thousands of people across the world quit

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vaping and quit smoking. So it's been a highly rewarding process.

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And currently, I am now finishing my final

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semester here at Michigan State University with a degree in supply chain management.

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That said, I may pass it off to you, Theresa.

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Thanks, Brenda. That's actually a really cool story.

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My name is Theresa Smith. My company is called

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Olafilter. We're a social business, and we

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have headquarters in Guatemala. Our product is called the Olafilter.

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It's a compact and affordable household water filter

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designed for consumers in developing countries. But we're a startup

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about a month away from entering the market.

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About a year and a half ago, we just saw a strong opportunity to do

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something meaningful. So the tap water in Latin America isn't safe

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to drink. And yeah, there's surprisingly few filtration

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options available in storage there, especially at a low enough

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price point to be affordable for the average family. So my

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business partner was working in Guatemala for an MGO,

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donating bucket filters to people who had taps.

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She was chafing against that inefficiency of not using the existing infrastructure

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and struggling to teach and explain the complexity of using that

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bucket filter. For us, the solution was obvious.

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Design a filter for these households, make it in country,

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sell it directly to this huge and overlooked market.

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We realized that we could build a sustainable business Walker and access to

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a product that would make a really positive impact on people's daily lives.

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Awesome. Thanks, Bet. Theresa. It's really lots

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of cool products. I love it. All right, Keith, what's a

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good word. Yeah. Hey, everybody, I'm Keith Phillips,

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founder and CEO of Real Lingua. My background is

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foreign language teaching. I taught French and Spanish for 20

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plus years at the College level, full time

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tenure track, and it was great. I loved it.

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But I heard enough over and over again from my

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students that there was this gap what we're

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learning doesn't seem to be how people actually

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use the language. Native speakers use the language. When I'm

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out there trying to communicate or listen or speak

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to them. And so as

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all entrepreneurs, you kind of get to a point where it's like you're

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both tired of hearing that but also really energized by

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the possibility of doing something about it. And so I reached

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that point back in about 2016 and

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took an early self designed retirement to launch Relinqua.

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And so we're a team now of about six.

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So, yeah, definitely six.

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Essentially, the crux of it

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is that all language tends to be when we're talking about using

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with other humans tends to be conversational,

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especially speaking. Right. So we're

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more than halfway to meeting

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people's needs in that way. With our current product,

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learners can listen to native speaker conversations. They can interact

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with them. They can do activities that help them progress

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in their language learning. The piece that we're really excited about

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that we're still working on but still really excited about is the Conversational

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AI for language learning. Basically, your mom,

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the best language teacher you ever had and your best friend all wrapped

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into one to help you learn that language you want to learn.

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Thanks. I feel like we could help

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a lot of people with the clean water for them

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to grow and then learn lots of languages and

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make healthy choices and all in one package.

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I was just going to ask Keith, I might have told this before when we

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were going through the application process, but what you're working

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on really resonated with me. I'll never forget. I took a couple of years

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of Spanish in high school, and I remember

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the first time that I encountered a native Spanish Speaker after

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taking two years of Spanish and I could not translate

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a single sentence. And that

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was kind of heartbreaking. I could write very fluently.

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I could read exceptionally well. But the first time I had an opportunity

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for a real conversation, it just completely

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fell flat on my face. And so, yeah,

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it's a huge disconnect. Yeah,

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Josh, I know.

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Josh, I can say you are special in many ways, but not in that way.

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Other people. I mean, you're talking like billions of other people

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on the planet. And because no one really needs to

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go to Paris, France, and recite a list of fruit when they

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get off the plane. Right.

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You know what a hotel room is? You know what fruit is? You can buy

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it without even speaking to anyone. But it would be nice when

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the cashier says, hey, how's it going to strike up a little conversation?

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And for them to know, you know, what you're doing, they can tell

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you're American looking at

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different ways they're looking at me. Right.

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But the art

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of knowing what to say and kind of how to say it,

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regardless of accent or regardless of how fast you say it

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there's something, too, that yes. So no, totally resonate to

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get you back to on that. Also, I took four years in

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high school and then two more years in College in Spanish,

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and never by the conversational. And now I'm

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starting a company in Guatemala, and luckily,

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my business partner is fluent, but my Spanish is strictly

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booked. And so I definitely need some help with my conversation.

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So you need to spend some time in a tropical paradise called Guatemala.

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Immersion. Immersion.

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Well, awesome. So I think you all kind of hit on some of the biggest

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challenges, but I guess the challenges that you're all trying

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to the solution that you have for those challenges, but from like a company,

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obviously, you all were kind of springing up during the Covet era.

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Did that present challenges? Were there other challenges that you have as a company

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face or you as an individual in the company? Kind of

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just speak, I guess, to that bigger idea? I'll go

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first this time, Theresa. So as

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far as what our challenges were, honestly, all of it,

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this is a brand new process for us. We started this business a

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year and a half ago, and we had to learn everything the planning, the pitching,

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the hiring, the marketing, the website design, the manufacturing, the it,

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all the things that anyone else has to learn when they're starting a

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business. But then also the added difficulties of setting up in a foreign

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country, a developing country, and making

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a product for low income consumers. So we had a

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ton of mentoring, and we made a lot of Pivots to get

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to where we are now. But with Covet specifically,

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on the whole, we've benefited from the changes from the Pandemic.

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I mean, the rise of virtual meets that came out of the panemic made

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it easier for us to navigate meetings and pitches

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with people across the country. When we started,

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we were three people, me in Michigan, one on

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the West Coast and one in Guatemala.

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And we've worked with each other entirely,

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virtually. We haven't actually met in person

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yet, although that's crazy. It's insane.

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It's insane. But I'm going to go around in a couple of weeks. So finally,

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we've gone a year and a half and been able to do everything so far

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virtually. That's fantastic. I think there's illustrates,

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I think, keeps phrased here that you're

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probably not unique in that regard either, in the sense of having tons of

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pivots, having to learn so many things,

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but where they knew, the virtual economy kind of helped in the sense of

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just being able nobody was afraid of it at that point because everybody kind of

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had to do it. Well, that was a clear,

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very localized risk, though, that you're setting up a business

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that is very much tied to a geography that you can't

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access if you wanted to. Certainly benefits

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from being able to work with a team in a distributed fashion. But was

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there any on the ground work that you had to do,

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and how did you navigate that?

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Well, in the beginning, beyond the groundwork we had to do was related

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to market research. And so one of

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our founders was in Guatemala at the time, and so she was handling that

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like taking our prototypes to people, having them

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tried them out, and getting some feedback later.

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Our current CEO, she moved down there in September,

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and she was pivotal to get our

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manufacturing started because that was not something we could do remotely

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because the culture down there is not like we can talk over the phone

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and get things taken care of. There's a lot of in person required in Latin

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American business dealings. And so she's

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been doing a lot of the heavy lifting on that side.

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I've been able to support a lot from up here, but we definitely would

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never been able to do the whole company if all of us are in the

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United States. Right. Keith, did you want to bring

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up the middle? Yeah, I can weigh in.

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So talking about doing business

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in person, I think our target is higher Ed

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in academia. I think there just is enough of that

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kind of culture of in person closing

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a deal in higher Ed and academia, and we

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just were not able to obviously take advantage of that.

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I'm just starting to be able to get back into kind of a

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cadence with that kind of thing. So that was a challenge for

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sure. But all things considered,

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Brendan, did you want to speak to some of your bigger challenges?

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Where do you manufacture, Brendan? Has that been a part

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of it? I was trying to remember where I can share. We've had

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a whole lot of challenges up from the very beginning. Once, a long

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time ago, in 2019, vaping was the clearing epidemic started

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to see people dying from all ages, from teens to young adults

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to older adults. And when I first set out,

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I certainly faced a number of people who thought that I'm creating

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something that's too simple to work and that trying

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to convey that early on remind you that Captain's Ear is literally

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just a unit with a silicone valve that pops

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open and pressurizes air coupled with natural extracts in

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our caps to provide flavor. So from

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there, getting to the RV stage took me two years

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of product development. With the Rise award early on,

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I was able to then say, hey, we have something that's definitely unique and

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we can build off of that. So with manufacturing,

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I was lucky and I had found my manufacturer. While we exhibited

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at CES 2020 in Las Vegas,

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we were sponsored by MSU to go. We've had a shark tank recruiter

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ask us to apply for the show. We've had people from all over the world

247
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say how much this means, especially when smoking is

248
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one of the deadliest addictions in the world. So here I

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was 20 years old, and now I'm building

250
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a team. I brought on my co founder, Jake. I brought on our third

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team member, Alex, who has yet to join us at

252
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a full time capacity coming up soon here. But once

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we've been able to spend those two years to really make sure we have the

254
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right product, once we launched, we've been

255
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growing too fast to handle. And at times, it's like

256
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seeing the amount of organic growth and direct success that we've been

257
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having with reaching our customers has been a highly rewarding journey,

258
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but not without its difficulties. During this time, my co founder,

259
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Jake had left to join a full time

260
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job in real estate out in Las Vegas. We're starting our fundraising,

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we're starting to look for new hires, and, of course,

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now we're dealing with having to have the next production ready.

263
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So it's certainly been a very exciting journey, and I'm really grateful

264
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for all the moments along the way, because I've been able to learn a tremendous

265
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amount from these challenges and hardships that help shape who I am

266
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today. That's awesome. That does sum up,

267
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I think, really nicely, the trajectory of a start up

268
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or a small company. Right? It's just tons of hurdles, tons of obstacles,

269
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but also this huge growth experience and this huge reward

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experience of being able to impact whatever segment of the market

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that you're hoping to impact.

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I have a tangential question, and maybe it's not tangential.

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Did I read on your social that you actually re addicted

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yourself so you could prove that it worked? Is that

275
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true, or is that urban legend? Very much true. So throughout

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the process, we've constantly found people without

277
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biases. These are people whom I do not have any connection to saying,

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hey, will you try out one of our prototypes? And I've heard an overwhelming

279
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positive response. People are going weeks without relapsing.

280
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And I'm thinking to myself, well, how easy is

281
00:17:32,936 --> 00:17:36,486
it? How is this actually impacting someone's ability to

282
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quit? One of the most difficult things to quit. So I wanted

283
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to be back in those shoes, and I wanted to know for sure that if

284
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I myself can have those same cravings and be at the point where I'm

285
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literally like, I need to take that next hint. Can I use

286
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my own invention, the capital zero, to help mitigate those oral

287
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fixations and cravings to which I've discovered? Yes,

288
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it does. And so this is the market.

289
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It's ready. And now we're seeing thousands of

290
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people from all across the world who are ordering the captain zero.

291
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We're, like, barely advertising, and people are just looking

292
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at stuff. And it's so exciting to hear of all the success stories

293
00:18:14,854 --> 00:18:18,738
do that. That's really cool. I think that's fun

294
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to kind of put that proof in the pudding for everybody,

295
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because I think vaping was one of those really kind of under

296
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the radar things where everybody thought that it was the solution to cigarette

297
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smoke and then turns out that it's not much better. And so I

298
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think it's one of those kind of insidious things where it was marketed as

299
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this silver bullet, just vape, and it's no big deal. And it's

300
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like, well, actually, it's not good and it's

301
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not really much better. And so it's cool to see it being tackled,

302
00:18:48,982 --> 00:18:53,178
something completely tangential. Brendan mentioned his

303
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cofounder leaving to go start or go take a full time job. And I've

304
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always thought because we've had people come and go from realingua

305
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and hope I'm going to take a full time job. And I've always thought,

306
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okay, well, good for you, because this is like way more than a full time

307
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job. It's like just

308
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a silly thought in my head and totally get why

309
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the myriad of reasons why people do it. But it's

310
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a lot of faint of heart for

311
00:19:29,176 --> 00:19:32,930
the zealots and the passionate and the driven. Not because

312
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a lot of people aren't those things, but just you have to have

313
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a certain good cocktail of all those pieces. But also

314
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take it from somebody who spent a couple of decades in the corporate world.

315
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After they go take that regular gig, they're going to spend all their time thinking

316
00:19:46,600 --> 00:19:49,862
about how they can get together with a couple of colleagues and bust out and

317
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go start their own thing.

318
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They'll be back. Yeah. I'm confident Jake is he's doing

319
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what he can right now to learn the technical skills within corporate,

320
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and then someday he'll do great things starting his own retros.

321
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I'm sure of it. Right? Yeah, exactly.

322
00:20:08,410 --> 00:20:12,158
So the next one, if I don't lose my voice in the process of

323
00:20:12,184 --> 00:20:16,154
asking it is just why is

324
00:20:16,192 --> 00:20:19,994
passing important to you and your innovation? And how did

325
00:20:20,032 --> 00:20:22,480
the Rise Award specifically help you out?

326
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And hopefully it did. We won't hear it if it didn't.

327
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Okay, I can

328
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jump in first.

329
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I think for us, for real, English patenting

330
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was important because we

331
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recognize obviously, after recognizing the gap and

332
00:20:45,516 --> 00:20:48,734
some of the pain points in the problem areas,

333
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we recognize that there actually is

334
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a patentable process in language

335
00:21:00,054 --> 00:21:03,794
learning that at least at that time we thought,

336
00:21:03,832 --> 00:21:07,526
okay, we can capture this, we can get this down,

337
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and then this is what we're going to use

338
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as the platform and build the product and deliver everything.

339
00:21:16,090 --> 00:21:19,314
The Rise Award really helped us to get tighter

340
00:21:19,362 --> 00:21:22,974
on our original patent, which was our system and method,

341
00:21:23,022 --> 00:21:25,670
which anyway. So, Ashley.

342
00:21:27,890 --> 00:21:31,426
Yes, Keith was in the beautiful world of software,

343
00:21:31,498 --> 00:21:35,134
which, as many of you may know, that is not easy for patenting.

344
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And so we really tried to bolster up

345
00:21:39,152 --> 00:21:44,614
various aspects of the patent to kind of make it more sustainable

346
00:21:44,662 --> 00:21:48,318
against those section 101 challenges. So, yeah, it was

347
00:21:48,344 --> 00:21:52,182
good stuff. Theresa, do you want to hop in

348
00:21:52,196 --> 00:21:56,082
there? Sure. So the

349
00:21:56,096 --> 00:21:59,410
Rise Award for us allowed us to get our disclosures

350
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filed before we got our first funding.

351
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And actually, in order to

352
00:22:06,404 --> 00:22:10,234
get that first funding, we wanted to have that disclosure out there and protected

353
00:22:10,402 --> 00:22:14,074
before we started pitching. But filing

354
00:22:14,122 --> 00:22:17,874
the provisional first gave us time to split by our designs over this

355
00:22:17,912 --> 00:22:21,274
last year to make sure that our international patent

356
00:22:21,322 --> 00:22:24,680
filing, which we're working on right now we just started this week,

357
00:22:25,190 --> 00:22:27,200
has all the details of our final design,

358
00:22:29,070 --> 00:22:33,026
but we didn't invent the filtration. There is innovation

359
00:22:33,098 --> 00:22:36,418
in the design of our product that makes it easier to use and more

360
00:22:36,444 --> 00:22:39,934
adaptable than some of our competitors. And having

361
00:22:39,972 --> 00:22:43,682
those disclosures protected gives us confidence as we're bringing

362
00:22:43,706 --> 00:22:47,218
it to market and we hope will create value for

363
00:22:47,244 --> 00:22:50,050
our companies on the road as we look towards acquisition.

364
00:22:50,730 --> 00:22:53,822
That's awesome. I think, Brendan and Teresa,

365
00:22:53,846 --> 00:22:57,442
yours, I think. I love your applications in

366
00:22:57,456 --> 00:23:01,126
the sense that it really shows the evolution of the products to

367
00:23:01,248 --> 00:23:03,682
as. We're kind of working on yours now, Theresa, because Brennan is a little bit

368
00:23:03,696 --> 00:23:07,318
further in the process, but kind of this evolution of which

369
00:23:07,344 --> 00:23:11,218
is really good from a patent perspective because you have

370
00:23:11,244 --> 00:23:14,794
all these other iterations that you can now protect in theory or maybe

371
00:23:14,952 --> 00:23:18,960
provide value to some sort of licensing or acquire down the road

372
00:23:19,410 --> 00:23:22,262
where you have your hopefully your commercial one in there, but then a whole bunch

373
00:23:22,286 --> 00:23:25,834
of the Gen 1234 or whatever that you've gone

374
00:23:25,872 --> 00:23:31,114
through in that process. So both your applications, I think, are really tell

375
00:23:31,152 --> 00:23:35,460
that story. So that's kind of fun. Yeah, it's definitely been.

376
00:23:36,810 --> 00:23:40,282
When asked the question of what has this award meant to me,

377
00:23:40,476 --> 00:23:44,062
when I was looking on Google, I searched up products to help myself

378
00:23:44,136 --> 00:23:46,090
quit. They didn't exist.

379
00:23:48,390 --> 00:23:52,140
This is going to be the person that's kind. So with that in mind,

380
00:23:52,530 --> 00:23:55,730
I knew to myself, this has to be patented.

381
00:23:55,910 --> 00:23:59,578
It's one thing to just produce it out there. It's another thing to really take

382
00:23:59,604 --> 00:24:02,998
ownership of the design and the functionality. And through

383
00:24:03,024 --> 00:24:06,490
the Rise award, it allowed me to

384
00:24:06,540 --> 00:24:09,994
learn with a lens from the patent world

385
00:24:10,152 --> 00:24:13,774
really in depth as far as what goes into it. I was quite

386
00:24:13,812 --> 00:24:17,220
flabbergasted when I had those 30 pages of

387
00:24:18,690 --> 00:24:22,560
how does anyone write this much about something? How is that possible?

388
00:24:23,250 --> 00:24:26,460
It's absolutely too stunned to speak.

389
00:24:26,790 --> 00:24:30,718
Instead, I was reviewing it all, but it's allowed me

390
00:24:30,744 --> 00:24:34,874
to then also be able to communicate

391
00:24:34,982 --> 00:24:38,998
our key differences at work. It's been able to provide me

392
00:24:39,024 --> 00:24:42,578
a way in which I can share. Okay, well, here's exactly how we're protecting

393
00:24:42,614 --> 00:24:46,270
it from a functional standpoint and how we can potentially license the technology,

394
00:24:46,440 --> 00:24:50,482
but also from a business standpoint, why it's important to dominate the market.

395
00:24:50,616 --> 00:24:53,280
With market saturation early on,

396
00:24:54,330 --> 00:24:58,190
as we've grown and developed, it's come to the point where we graduate

397
00:24:58,250 --> 00:25:01,774
from the provisional into a nonprovisional. So at that point, I was like,

398
00:25:01,812 --> 00:25:04,378
well, I know whose door I'm coming to knock on. And I said,

399
00:25:04,464 --> 00:25:08,398
hey, let's hop back on the phone let's get this utility going.

400
00:25:08,484 --> 00:25:12,298
And I'm so excited that we're now pass

401
00:25:12,324 --> 00:25:16,298
the process of having the first examination. So hopefully, fingers crossed

402
00:25:16,454 --> 00:25:19,702
things go through. Yeah, it's looking good. So we

403
00:25:19,716 --> 00:25:23,398
did an examiner interview, so hopefully that will put us in the good

404
00:25:23,424 --> 00:25:27,300
camp. So I guess kind of building on that question,

405
00:25:29,070 --> 00:25:32,494
I think almost everybody, but maybe Keith was pretty

406
00:25:32,532 --> 00:25:36,118
new to the patenting process, I think. But but

407
00:25:36,144 --> 00:25:40,174
in any case, what's the biggest piece of advice that you'd give to

408
00:25:40,212 --> 00:25:42,490
inventors? New to patenting.

409
00:25:43,470 --> 00:25:47,674
I originally worked for Toyota for 20 years, and so

410
00:25:47,772 --> 00:25:51,394
the idea of making a patent I was very familiar with because

411
00:25:51,432 --> 00:25:55,498
a lot of my coworkers got them and we were encouraged to apply for

412
00:25:55,524 --> 00:25:59,122
one. But I personally never had. So this was actually

413
00:25:59,196 --> 00:26:02,770
a brand new experience for me, but I

414
00:26:02,820 --> 00:26:06,480
am very much in the do it yourself mentality. So at

415
00:26:06,870 --> 00:26:08,520
the bottom,

416
00:26:09,870 --> 00:26:12,902
you were super. So just full disclosure.

417
00:26:12,926 --> 00:26:16,774
Theresa actually one of the Rise awards that we did with

418
00:26:16,812 --> 00:26:20,158
her with Olafilter was a

419
00:26:20,184 --> 00:26:24,274
different scope. Basically, Teresa presented this

420
00:26:24,432 --> 00:26:28,318
pretty amazing provisional packet where I just worked with

421
00:26:28,344 --> 00:26:31,798
her to fine tune it and tweak it and do claims and everything.

422
00:26:31,884 --> 00:26:34,450
But go ahead and you definitely did your homework.

423
00:26:35,790 --> 00:26:39,658
Yeah, I checked out. What is it? The yellow book? I think it is.

424
00:26:39,744 --> 00:26:43,150
It's like the book for teaching yourself how to write a patents,

425
00:26:43,590 --> 00:26:46,798
read the whole thing, covered, covered, and marked it, and then

426
00:26:46,824 --> 00:26:48,130
wrote my own patents.

427
00:26:50,010 --> 00:26:53,506
But still, I was baffled by

428
00:26:53,568 --> 00:26:56,554
the process, and I knew that it was really easy to do it wrong.

429
00:26:56,592 --> 00:26:59,700
And so I had zero intention of ever filing it on my own.

430
00:27:00,510 --> 00:27:03,958
I was really happy to find somebody because even if it wasn't to write

431
00:27:03,984 --> 00:27:07,078
the whole thing from zero, I needed a professional to

432
00:27:07,104 --> 00:27:10,246
make sure that it was getting filed correctly and everything was all right.

433
00:27:10,308 --> 00:27:13,922
And then now we're

434
00:27:13,946 --> 00:27:17,170
starting on the real following.

435
00:27:18,030 --> 00:27:21,418
I'm doing the same thing. I'm updating it to everything that we've done

436
00:27:21,444 --> 00:27:25,054
this year, and I'll hand it over to you guys with most of it

437
00:27:25,092 --> 00:27:28,502
probably done, but it's still going to need, like, all of your touches,

438
00:27:28,526 --> 00:27:31,874
and it will still be worth having the professionals

439
00:27:31,922 --> 00:27:35,882
do it. So I guess my recommendation

440
00:27:35,966 --> 00:27:39,922
would be I think there's a good, cost effective way to do it.

441
00:27:40,116 --> 00:27:43,238
It's not impossible to write, especially like I'm an engineer,

442
00:27:43,274 --> 00:27:46,438
so writing technically comes naturally to me.

443
00:27:46,524 --> 00:27:49,920
So it wasn't like a big step outside of my comfort zone to write

444
00:27:50,790 --> 00:27:53,962
for a patent. So if you have

445
00:27:53,976 --> 00:27:57,502
that similar background, don't be afraid to tackle the

446
00:27:57,516 --> 00:28:01,080
beginning, at least on your own, but then hand it over.

447
00:28:05,290 --> 00:28:08,786
That's certainly impressive, being able to read through and really started.

448
00:28:08,848 --> 00:28:11,620
I'm sure Ashley was quite impressed. Like, oh, wow, look at this.

449
00:28:17,030 --> 00:28:20,914
Certainly for someone like me who is rather inexperienced,

450
00:28:20,962 --> 00:28:24,502
they're more of a generalist. My one piece of advice, find an expert

451
00:28:24,526 --> 00:28:25,760
to do it for you.

452
00:28:28,010 --> 00:28:31,462
Seriously. It's just something like a Pandora's

453
00:28:31,486 --> 00:28:35,322
box I can't imagine myself going into. So I

454
00:28:35,336 --> 00:28:39,042
think it's really helped you to take that time and working together

455
00:28:39,116 --> 00:28:42,214
in conjunction, which has allowed me to work on the product development

456
00:28:42,262 --> 00:28:45,810
side of things, the strictly engineering part, rather than the

457
00:28:45,920 --> 00:28:49,518
documenting and all the nitpicky stuff

458
00:28:49,544 --> 00:28:53,682
that goes into patenting. Oh, go ahead.

459
00:28:53,876 --> 00:28:56,938
Yeah. I was just going to segue and say I'd love to hear how Keith

460
00:28:56,974 --> 00:29:00,370
has approached it from the software side of things, too. But Ashley.

461
00:29:00,550 --> 00:29:03,642
Yeah, I'll jump in there real quick. I think the other interesting thing, and I

462
00:29:03,656 --> 00:29:07,098
think Keith had this little bit from his office action, some of the file history

463
00:29:07,184 --> 00:29:10,422
for his patents, but you all kind of did a

464
00:29:10,436 --> 00:29:13,918
lot of either you did it yourself or you sourced

465
00:29:13,954 --> 00:29:16,338
it out, but some searching. And I think you kind of hit on that,

466
00:29:16,364 --> 00:29:20,002
Brendan, too, the fact that you kind of knew or you had searches

467
00:29:20,026 --> 00:29:22,794
and you knew kind of how to or we kind of work to figure out

468
00:29:22,832 --> 00:29:25,890
what was the piece that was above and beyond the art.

469
00:29:25,940 --> 00:29:29,518
And same with Teresa. You had a really good idea about what competitors

470
00:29:29,554 --> 00:29:32,226
were out there. And then I think I can't remember if we did a little

471
00:29:32,228 --> 00:29:36,022
bit of searching or not, but just knowing kind of what's

472
00:29:36,046 --> 00:29:39,826
out there and what sets you apart, not only from a commercial perspective.

473
00:29:39,898 --> 00:29:43,170
Right. But what sets you apart from a device perspective.

474
00:29:44,690 --> 00:29:48,198
What is the value that you're providing to a customer and how can you

475
00:29:48,224 --> 00:29:51,694
protect what that value is with the patent? And it's trying to find that intersection,

476
00:29:51,742 --> 00:29:55,366
which isn't always easy, but doing some of the searching

477
00:29:55,558 --> 00:29:59,682
said that we all did. You all did, I think was really pivotal in

478
00:29:59,696 --> 00:30:00,620
that as well.

479
00:30:04,170 --> 00:30:07,858
Yeah. So second,

480
00:30:07,944 --> 00:30:11,940
everything that Theresa and Brendan said, first of all,

481
00:30:12,870 --> 00:30:16,210
definitely professional help as

482
00:30:16,260 --> 00:30:19,620
early in the process as possible.

483
00:30:22,510 --> 00:30:25,878
Just a quick little personal note. And then there's a point to this. I wrote

484
00:30:25,914 --> 00:30:29,498
a screenplay, a feature length screenplay, right after

485
00:30:29,524 --> 00:30:33,486
our first son was born. So he's sleeping. And I finished

486
00:30:33,498 --> 00:30:37,070
my grading. And just to blow up a little statement,

487
00:30:37,570 --> 00:30:41,162
as a humanities major, I know that big

488
00:30:41,236 --> 00:30:45,338
long books get written a little bit at a time. And I

489
00:30:45,364 --> 00:30:49,166
think what I wish I would have done with the patent stuff is

490
00:30:49,348 --> 00:30:52,420
every time I had an idea to write it down,

491
00:30:53,230 --> 00:30:56,798
a lot of stuff down. But it was almost like the

492
00:30:56,824 --> 00:31:00,746
cliche of the person bringing the shoe box of all the

493
00:31:00,928 --> 00:31:04,190
receipts and all that other stuff to their accountant,

494
00:31:05,230 --> 00:31:09,062
actually kind of laughing. There was a lot of that when

495
00:31:09,076 --> 00:31:14,582
we did our initial file and actually a lot of it when we pivoted with

496
00:31:14,596 --> 00:31:18,758
Aurora and Ashley and her team, too. But, yeah, just to write everything

497
00:31:18,844 --> 00:31:22,382
down as early as possible and as often as

498
00:31:22,396 --> 00:31:25,538
possible. No, it's awesome. And to

499
00:31:25,564 --> 00:31:29,090
that point, I think that's hugely critical. That kind of

500
00:31:29,140 --> 00:31:32,354
mirrors that development progression, too. Right.

501
00:31:32,392 --> 00:31:35,378
I mean, it's understood that you're developing all those things, but it's ideas that you

502
00:31:35,404 --> 00:31:39,062
had. I think the only leery I can put

503
00:31:39,076 --> 00:31:43,418
in there that and you probably already know this, that the whole it

504
00:31:43,444 --> 00:31:46,478
used to be enough to write down your ideas and mail them to yourself or

505
00:31:46,504 --> 00:31:49,778
postmark them. Right. To get that invention date. But now you

506
00:31:49,804 --> 00:31:53,702
have to put them on file. So if it's an idea that's valuable to

507
00:31:53,716 --> 00:31:57,182
your company and you foresee it being in your product pipeline or being in

508
00:31:57,256 --> 00:32:00,482
the pipeline for your competitors to get around you, that's one

509
00:32:00,496 --> 00:32:03,820
of those ones that you really do want to get on file early.

510
00:32:04,150 --> 00:32:07,382
And so, yeah, writing down everything. I mean, basically creating your own

511
00:32:07,396 --> 00:32:09,520
little invention disclosure file. Right.

512
00:32:11,350 --> 00:32:14,934
The nice side effect of that, too, is that whole Gulf knowledge

513
00:32:14,982 --> 00:32:18,758
concept, where the more innately you begin to

514
00:32:18,844 --> 00:32:23,042
understand something, the harder it gets for you to speak discreetly about

515
00:32:23,116 --> 00:32:26,798
it. And so you probably might actually end

516
00:32:26,824 --> 00:32:30,938
up with a better patent if you start personally writing about it sooner as

517
00:32:30,964 --> 00:32:34,070
you're understanding its discrete components,

518
00:32:34,450 --> 00:32:37,878
because eventually you just start it's breathing,

519
00:32:37,914 --> 00:32:41,922
it's walking. You're not really thinking about it. But as Brennan

520
00:32:41,946 --> 00:32:45,858
said, you got to take that quote, unquote simple concept

521
00:32:45,894 --> 00:32:49,214
and turn it into 30 pages of detailed specification. And so you really

522
00:32:49,252 --> 00:32:52,420
have to be able to explain it inside out, upside down.

523
00:32:54,430 --> 00:32:57,674
I'd like to go back and talk a little more about what you were saying

524
00:32:57,712 --> 00:33:00,834
about research, like doing your own research before you write your patents

525
00:33:00,882 --> 00:33:04,482
about what else is in the field, like what are the prior arts

526
00:33:04,566 --> 00:33:07,838
that are in the field. And I found that

527
00:33:07,864 --> 00:33:11,822
really helpful when we were trying to determine what were

528
00:33:11,836 --> 00:33:15,362
the key features of our innovation over within the

529
00:33:15,376 --> 00:33:19,002
field. My product is very different from Brendan's, where it's

530
00:33:19,026 --> 00:33:22,394
fairly new. We have very few competitors a water

531
00:33:22,432 --> 00:33:25,674
filter. We've been around for quite a long time, and so there's

532
00:33:25,722 --> 00:33:29,140
a lot of water filter patents out there. And so it took a lot of

533
00:33:29,590 --> 00:33:37,938
pouring through dozens of other existing and

534
00:33:38,024 --> 00:33:41,874
finding the specific things

535
00:33:41,912 --> 00:33:45,042
that ours were doing that these other ones weren't doing. And it

536
00:33:45,056 --> 00:33:48,582
helped me Hone in on what to say in the patent. Like, what are

537
00:33:48,596 --> 00:33:50,850
the features that I wanted to acknowledge?

538
00:33:52,370 --> 00:33:58,390
We did put in, like a section about specific advantages

539
00:33:58,450 --> 00:34:01,474
ours has or disadvantages that our competitors

540
00:34:01,522 --> 00:34:05,454
have that my invention was addressing. And I think that is

541
00:34:05,492 --> 00:34:08,310
a useful thing to have in mind when it comes to leaving.

542
00:34:08,630 --> 00:34:12,162
Right. And for pitching, honestly, I feel like pitching all

543
00:34:12,176 --> 00:34:15,622
those things about what makes you different, what makes you think that you're

544
00:34:15,646 --> 00:34:19,458
going to solve this problem or what sets you apart is all that

545
00:34:19,484 --> 00:34:22,594
kind of weaves together. I mean, there is definitely consumer aspects,

546
00:34:22,702 --> 00:34:25,842
non technical problems that you're solving, and there's technical problems that

547
00:34:25,856 --> 00:34:29,038
you're solving. But ideally, a successful

548
00:34:29,074 --> 00:34:32,518
product that you want to protect has both of those aspects.

549
00:34:32,554 --> 00:34:35,994
Right. The non technical being consumer problems and the technical ones

550
00:34:36,032 --> 00:34:40,282
being the ones that in theory, lead to the solutions

551
00:34:40,306 --> 00:34:43,654
for the non technical ones. And you protect the solutions to the technical

552
00:34:43,702 --> 00:34:47,370
problems. Yeah. And I really appreciate that point,

553
00:34:47,420 --> 00:34:50,938
too, Teresa Ashley, because when I've

554
00:34:50,974 --> 00:34:55,018
been meeting with investors, the question comes up, well, what is protectable?

555
00:34:55,174 --> 00:34:58,642
And it's one thing to have the full documentation

556
00:34:58,726 --> 00:35:02,710
from the legal aspect, from the paralegals,

557
00:35:02,830 --> 00:35:06,258
the patent attorneys, the examiners who really understand

558
00:35:06,344 --> 00:35:10,206
the breadth of the technical side of things. But being able to actually

559
00:35:10,388 --> 00:35:14,622
simplify 30 pages into three sentences and

560
00:35:14,636 --> 00:35:17,706
of its own can be a challenge. Which is why I would also

561
00:35:17,768 --> 00:35:21,570
add on and advise that when communicating what

562
00:35:21,620 --> 00:35:25,098
is unique, being able to really Hone in on the

563
00:35:25,124 --> 00:35:28,446
storytelling component and convey the key points

564
00:35:28,508 --> 00:35:32,262
in a succinct manner is also very important. Also get

565
00:35:32,336 --> 00:35:35,790
additional funding, which can drive more innovation and

566
00:35:35,960 --> 00:35:39,654
protection. Of course, it is so an

567
00:35:39,692 --> 00:35:43,938
art to learning how to speak about your product to

568
00:35:43,964 --> 00:35:46,460
someone who knows nothing about it.

569
00:35:47,870 --> 00:35:51,714
It is very much a night. Feel free to answer

570
00:35:51,812 --> 00:35:55,400
both of these. Either of these, however you see fit.

571
00:35:56,210 --> 00:36:00,162
The biggest surprise you've encountered as

572
00:36:00,176 --> 00:36:03,642
you move into market or get closer to market and or the most

573
00:36:03,656 --> 00:36:07,400
surprising feedback you've received that could be interesting.

574
00:36:08,090 --> 00:36:12,150
The most surprising investor story is Brendan.

575
00:36:14,090 --> 00:36:17,142
Sure. Because I've been in market for a little bit, I've had some time to

576
00:36:17,156 --> 00:36:19,520
actually hear some of this feedback from people.

577
00:36:21,690 --> 00:36:25,210
So between being surprised and I think rewarding are the two

578
00:36:25,260 --> 00:36:29,002
parts of it, the most rewarding has been hearing people who

579
00:36:29,016 --> 00:36:32,950
are using the Zero for months. Right. They've been using the same

580
00:36:33,000 --> 00:36:36,890
starter pack. I mean, from the initial get go, my intention

581
00:36:36,950 --> 00:36:41,698
was to create a solution that addresses a behavioral addiction by

582
00:36:41,724 --> 00:36:45,434
solving that wall fixation craving and also offset

583
00:36:45,602 --> 00:36:48,934
waste issues, especially with this disposable vapes being

584
00:36:48,972 --> 00:36:52,574
tossed all the time. Hear someone say, Look, I've been using my same Capital

585
00:36:52,622 --> 00:36:56,602
Zero with new cap packs for months, and I haven't relapsed once

586
00:36:56,736 --> 00:36:59,820
has been so incredibly rewarding and

587
00:37:00,150 --> 00:37:05,122
surprising. It's funny how there

588
00:37:05,136 --> 00:37:08,510
are still so many customers out there who think that this is a vape.

589
00:37:08,630 --> 00:37:12,734
When our listing explicitly have our packaging

590
00:37:12,782 --> 00:37:16,978
listed over, it says you're a charge. We're like, look, it's just

591
00:37:17,064 --> 00:37:20,354
pressurized flavored air. I mean, we started comments

592
00:37:20,402 --> 00:37:23,726
where people are like, oh, this doesn't have smoke or it doesn't

593
00:37:23,738 --> 00:37:27,230
have nicotine. This is terrible. I'm like, did you know what you're buying?

594
00:37:27,350 --> 00:37:33,290
Did you read the package marketing?

595
00:37:33,350 --> 00:37:36,958
You are correct. But if anything teaches me,

596
00:37:36,984 --> 00:37:40,620
I got to do better, make it even more simpler to understand.

597
00:37:44,830 --> 00:37:47,822
I can go. So, yeah,

598
00:37:47,896 --> 00:37:52,130
we've been on the market, out on the market for a while now

599
00:37:52,180 --> 00:37:56,078
as well. So what we did, I think

600
00:37:56,104 --> 00:37:59,920
it's clever. I didn't come up with it. So I can say that I think

601
00:38:01,330 --> 00:38:05,262
our marketing director at the time said, hey, if we're

602
00:38:05,286 --> 00:38:09,110
trying to do, like, a target B to B into higher

603
00:38:09,160 --> 00:38:12,998
Ed. Okay, cool. So we're not going to have students

604
00:38:13,084 --> 00:38:17,622
pay for it directly. It'll be a cost that's

605
00:38:17,646 --> 00:38:20,210
borne by the universities, the colleges.

606
00:38:20,830 --> 00:38:23,942
But we need to get some proof. We're not going to knock on

607
00:38:24,076 --> 00:38:27,714
ten University doors and get ten customers. So let's

608
00:38:27,762 --> 00:38:33,134
do some B to C and

609
00:38:33,172 --> 00:38:36,530
get some proof. That way, we did a paid beta, essentially,

610
00:38:39,250 --> 00:38:43,658
that was super helpful for us. Heard all

611
00:38:43,684 --> 00:38:47,166
kinds of feedback, which is always good, right? You're hearing feedback.

612
00:38:47,238 --> 00:38:51,002
That's a good thing. That then

613
00:38:51,076 --> 00:38:54,662
led to being able to do

614
00:38:54,736 --> 00:39:00,314
through a couple of network connections to

615
00:39:00,352 --> 00:39:04,086
being able to do a pilot with a major League

616
00:39:04,218 --> 00:39:08,102
sports team. Really? Wow. That's a

617
00:39:08,116 --> 00:39:11,742
great angle. We hadn't

618
00:39:11,766 --> 00:39:15,050
really thought about this, but again, through our connections,

619
00:39:17,230 --> 00:39:21,374
I can't say a whole lot real

620
00:39:21,412 --> 00:39:24,818
specifics. But the cool thing was here

621
00:39:24,844 --> 00:39:28,794
we are thinking higher Ed, and we're kind of approach.

622
00:39:28,842 --> 00:39:32,426
How can we use real English? We're going

623
00:39:32,428 --> 00:39:36,198
to be running our summer ESL

624
00:39:36,294 --> 00:39:40,540
program for players who are

625
00:39:41,110 --> 00:39:45,042
needing some ESL classes.

626
00:39:45,126 --> 00:39:48,990
Okay, cool. Yeah, that sounds awesome. So from our perspective,

627
00:39:49,110 --> 00:39:52,742
B to C, someone gets on the web app and

628
00:39:52,816 --> 00:39:56,462
they can interact with it anytime they want. And that's kind of the

629
00:39:56,536 --> 00:39:59,920
teacher that's self directed, self autonomous learning.

630
00:40:00,370 --> 00:40:04,986
With the pilot, what we were able to learn was instructors

631
00:40:05,058 --> 00:40:10,434
can use the product synchronously

632
00:40:10,602 --> 00:40:14,570
right in the client asynchronously assign things

633
00:40:14,740 --> 00:40:18,222
and basically as the driver

634
00:40:18,246 --> 00:40:22,022
of the curriculum. And so this pilot was 16 weeks long.

635
00:40:22,216 --> 00:40:25,000
We have 16 lessons in A level.

636
00:40:25,870 --> 00:40:29,378
And so it was perfect a few

637
00:40:29,404 --> 00:40:33,278
times a week, and we got all this great feedback from

638
00:40:33,304 --> 00:40:34,360
the players themselves.

639
00:40:36,490 --> 00:40:39,338
That was great. The feedback I loved the most,

640
00:40:39,424 --> 00:40:42,602
though, was one of the instructors who we

641
00:40:42,616 --> 00:40:46,420
know said, I've been doing this for six years

642
00:40:47,230 --> 00:40:51,062
as my summer gig. He happens to be

643
00:40:51,076 --> 00:40:54,698
a professor. I've been doing this for six years as my

644
00:40:54,724 --> 00:40:59,274
summer gig. And this year, these players seem

645
00:40:59,382 --> 00:41:02,738
and not always the same players. Obviously, it changes. But this

646
00:41:02,764 --> 00:41:06,722
year, these players seem a lot more engaged. They're interested in

647
00:41:06,856 --> 00:41:10,382
the class. They're not staring down at their phones or staring off in the

648
00:41:10,396 --> 00:41:12,700
space. They don't seem annoyed by.

649
00:41:16,310 --> 00:41:19,302
And we're just like, yes, that's it. That's awesome.

650
00:41:19,376 --> 00:41:24,702
So it kind of taught us that. All right, well, we're thinking higher Ed in

651
00:41:24,716 --> 00:41:28,062
the back of our minds, had workforce development and innovation on our brains as

652
00:41:28,076 --> 00:41:31,714
well, future work kind of thing. But that was kind of a revelation.

653
00:41:31,762 --> 00:41:36,190
US like, okay, there are other learning scenarios

654
00:41:36,310 --> 00:41:39,882
that this could be applied to. So, yeah, that was fun. That's cool.

655
00:41:39,956 --> 00:41:43,818
My neat opportunity, too. For me,

656
00:41:43,844 --> 00:41:47,838
I think the surprise was how

657
00:41:47,864 --> 00:41:51,138
much iteration we were going to do as a company and as

658
00:41:51,164 --> 00:41:56,242
an engineer. It really should not have been surprising to me because it's

659
00:41:56,266 --> 00:41:59,634
a thing you do in design. And I have 20 years of iteration design behind

660
00:41:59,672 --> 00:42:02,766
me. And so I should have known better. But I was still

661
00:42:02,888 --> 00:42:07,078
just blindsided by how many times we've reinvented

662
00:42:07,114 --> 00:42:10,662
ourselves over the last year from the design of

663
00:42:10,676 --> 00:42:14,022
our parts. When we wrote our provisional pen,

664
00:42:14,096 --> 00:42:17,574
it was three pieces. And when we took that two

665
00:42:17,612 --> 00:42:21,330
people for our first beta trial, it failed us early.

666
00:42:21,380 --> 00:42:25,062
Every single person hated it. So it became two pieces. We kicked off

667
00:42:25,076 --> 00:42:28,520
our production and then to

668
00:42:29,510 --> 00:42:33,358
our manufacturing process. We originally had the humorous

669
00:42:33,514 --> 00:42:37,150
that we would buy an ejection

670
00:42:37,210 --> 00:42:40,606
molder and actually make our own housing,

671
00:42:40,678 --> 00:42:44,362
and then we would put our own membranes. And then in the journey

672
00:42:44,386 --> 00:42:48,162
of understanding what that is, we realized it was completely out of

673
00:42:48,176 --> 00:42:51,978
our scope. All your industry, each of them on their own. It should be left

674
00:42:52,004 --> 00:42:56,430
to the professionals and then our

675
00:42:56,480 --> 00:43:00,138
customer marketing channels. At the beginning, we were like

676
00:43:00,284 --> 00:43:03,990
traditional retail, obviously, the hardware stored on the streets

677
00:43:04,430 --> 00:43:08,718
and NGOs, of course, because they buy them already. And in

678
00:43:08,744 --> 00:43:15,494
talking to people, we've realized there's so many more options and more appropriate

679
00:43:15,542 --> 00:43:19,054
for the markets we're looking into and like cooperatives and

680
00:43:19,092 --> 00:43:23,238
last round distributors. And that's

681
00:43:23,274 --> 00:43:26,822
my surprise. Like how many times I've just reinvented our company in the

682
00:43:26,836 --> 00:43:30,794
last year. But I'm hoping because we are like a month away from getting into

683
00:43:30,832 --> 00:43:34,770
the market and actually slowly

684
00:43:34,830 --> 00:43:38,140
and so I'm hoping that will calm down and maybe

685
00:43:38,590 --> 00:43:43,646
we've hit most of our major pivots, at least major

686
00:43:43,708 --> 00:43:47,582
ones. And it'll just be kind of calmer going forward as

687
00:43:47,596 --> 00:43:52,610
long as the design is largely frozen until,

688
00:43:52,660 --> 00:43:55,780
you know, product expansion and we create new things. Yeah,

689
00:43:56,470 --> 00:43:58,790
that's a good problem to have product expansion,

690
00:44:00,190 --> 00:44:03,458
although we have that kind of not quite market, but almost market

691
00:44:03,544 --> 00:44:07,240
the kind of early market and kind of a little bit later market, the whole.

692
00:44:07,990 --> 00:44:12,398
Yeah. Ran the gamut. Okay, so what

693
00:44:12,424 --> 00:44:16,670
would you say over the course of your journey? This journey,

694
00:44:17,290 --> 00:44:19,010
this product, this invention?

695
00:44:20,470 --> 00:44:23,838
What's the smartest thing you've done? What's the dumbest

696
00:44:23,874 --> 00:44:27,410
thing you've done? And what did you learn from both?

697
00:44:27,580 --> 00:44:31,322
This is some truth serum. Time for

698
00:44:31,336 --> 00:44:34,598
me. What pops into my head is just what I was saying before about her

699
00:44:34,624 --> 00:44:38,018
membrane potting, just the idea that we

700
00:44:38,044 --> 00:44:41,870
could have done every part of our process in house and that we were

701
00:44:42,040 --> 00:44:46,178
just looking back on it just shocking if

702
00:44:46,204 --> 00:44:49,310
we had gone that way, like how hard our life would be right now.

703
00:44:49,480 --> 00:44:53,018
But we were doing we just didn't know what it

704
00:44:53,044 --> 00:44:56,594
seemed like such a simple concept of how to

705
00:44:56,632 --> 00:45:03,498
create a filter cartridge. And it

706
00:45:03,524 --> 00:45:06,750
actually took a new tech pitch

707
00:45:07,550 --> 00:45:11,118
we were discussing. Like we were talking about our technology and

708
00:45:11,144 --> 00:45:14,814
someone in the audience asked a question about the potty process.

709
00:45:14,972 --> 00:45:18,546
And so we met with him afterwards and had a meeting and that led to

710
00:45:18,608 --> 00:45:22,134
our journey to understanding the full engineering behind it.

711
00:45:22,232 --> 00:45:26,538
Ended up talking to the guy Korea who invented this technology.

712
00:45:26,684 --> 00:45:30,426
Oh, wow, that's cool. And made the whole circle and

713
00:45:30,488 --> 00:45:34,362
then decided just outsource it. I think

714
00:45:34,376 --> 00:45:38,458
that's kind of the journey of startups, though, too, is realizing what you're

715
00:45:38,494 --> 00:45:41,662
good at and maybe like what you could be good at but don't

716
00:45:41,686 --> 00:45:44,974
have time to be good at and what you're not good at and then deciding

717
00:45:45,022 --> 00:45:49,002
how you're going to focus your energies. Right. Because any

718
00:45:49,076 --> 00:45:52,662
dedicated person, given enough time, could probably be good at almost anything. Right.

719
00:45:52,736 --> 00:45:56,362
But the reality is the startup world has you pulled

720
00:45:56,386 --> 00:46:00,042
in 16 million different directions, and so you kind of got to choose what

721
00:46:00,056 --> 00:46:03,378
you're going to be good at and let other people handle the

722
00:46:03,404 --> 00:46:06,882
other stuff. Yeah, absolutely. That's why we had

723
00:46:06,896 --> 00:46:10,278
to have that discussion internally. We were like, what kind of company are we building?

724
00:46:10,424 --> 00:46:14,334
Are we building a manufacturing company? We're building a membrane potting company.

725
00:46:14,432 --> 00:46:17,300
No, we're building a filter selling company.

726
00:46:17,630 --> 00:46:21,558
We just cut everything else away. And this

727
00:46:21,584 --> 00:46:24,918
is what we're going to do. Yeah. Making that decision and making us really

728
00:46:24,944 --> 00:46:28,362
think about what we wanted our company to be because we can't be everything.

729
00:46:28,556 --> 00:46:31,854
Right. That's cool. So that was

730
00:46:31,952 --> 00:46:34,638
kind of the smartest and the dumbest all packaged up in one.

731
00:46:34,784 --> 00:46:35,480
Yes.

732
00:46:40,110 --> 00:46:43,114
I feel like the intro to this podcast could be that knowing when to hold

733
00:46:43,152 --> 00:46:46,502
them, knowing when to fold them that song, I won't

734
00:46:46,526 --> 00:46:49,786
sing it and scare you all.

735
00:46:49,968 --> 00:46:59,274
See if we can get the rights for that. Yeah. An IP

736
00:46:59,322 --> 00:47:01,840
company that's ripping off Copyright. Not cool.

737
00:47:05,750 --> 00:47:09,078
Sure. I could probably share some sentiments which I do

738
00:47:09,104 --> 00:47:12,246
agree with much of what was said. I mean, I think

739
00:47:12,308 --> 00:47:15,942
one of the smartest things I've been able to do throughout my career thus far

740
00:47:16,016 --> 00:47:19,400
at Cap Knows has been to seek outward help.

741
00:47:19,790 --> 00:47:23,334
It's because I come into this

742
00:47:23,372 --> 00:47:27,102
space with only a limited amount of experience, being able to

743
00:47:27,176 --> 00:47:30,742
reach out to mentors with years and years of practice

744
00:47:30,826 --> 00:47:35,362
expertise, with tried and true technical

745
00:47:35,446 --> 00:47:39,150
knowledge, from learning, from their failures. I've been able to make

746
00:47:39,200 --> 00:47:42,790
much better decisions and look at situations

747
00:47:42,850 --> 00:47:46,702
much more critically from a more logistical

748
00:47:46,786 --> 00:47:50,778
point of view, but also objectively. And I've been able to kind

749
00:47:50,804 --> 00:47:54,354
of improve myself as a person throughout that.

750
00:47:54,392 --> 00:47:57,630
And I think that by continuing to see myself

751
00:47:57,740 --> 00:48:00,742
as a sponge,

752
00:48:00,766 --> 00:48:04,758
to soak up advice and to soak up knowledge, I've been

753
00:48:04,784 --> 00:48:08,202
able to just keep growing and learning and adapting as we continue

754
00:48:08,276 --> 00:48:11,070
to face new challenges. That said,

755
00:48:11,180 --> 00:48:16,254
one of the dumbest things I think I could be doing is not

756
00:48:16,292 --> 00:48:20,300
being able to focus primarily on just one thing.

757
00:48:20,630 --> 00:48:23,922
Granted, I understand too, as a founder and

758
00:48:24,056 --> 00:48:27,790
right now I'm like the primary full time member.

759
00:48:27,850 --> 00:48:31,074
I'm balancing a lot of everything. So more

760
00:48:31,112 --> 00:48:34,518
than anything, I want to expand my team and to bring on my

761
00:48:34,544 --> 00:48:38,038
business partner, Alex, full time. I want to find our next marketing

762
00:48:38,074 --> 00:48:40,830
higher. I want to expand and be able to delegate more,

763
00:48:40,880 --> 00:48:44,730
because when my one goal is fundraising, at this point,

764
00:48:44,780 --> 00:48:48,618
it gets very difficult to successfully do that. When I have to

765
00:48:48,644 --> 00:48:52,474
manage operations, customer success, all these other metrics,

766
00:48:52,582 --> 00:48:56,050
and then feel as if I'm not making a tremendous amount of growth

767
00:48:56,110 --> 00:48:59,682
on the one thing that I want to do well on. So I'm definitely

768
00:48:59,756 --> 00:49:03,850
trying my best. And as with this whole journey,

769
00:49:04,030 --> 00:49:07,830
it's like a marathon with many sprints in between.

770
00:49:08,000 --> 00:49:11,480
It's also good to take too well.

771
00:49:12,770 --> 00:49:16,218
I think that so captures the thing so many small companies

772
00:49:16,304 --> 00:49:19,914
is that this and we've experienced this here, too. Even just you have these

773
00:49:20,072 --> 00:49:23,598
periods of growth and there are stretch times

774
00:49:23,684 --> 00:49:27,430
where you're like, do I have enough to hire

775
00:49:27,490 --> 00:49:30,738
somebody? Do I just bite it off knowing and

776
00:49:30,764 --> 00:49:34,926
hoping that it's going to be there, that, you know, the sales

777
00:49:34,988 --> 00:49:37,938
are going to be there, the venture capital, whatever is going to be there,

778
00:49:37,964 --> 00:49:41,862
because I can't grow if I don't hire somebody because

779
00:49:41,996 --> 00:49:45,558
you're only one person, there's only 24 hours in a day, no matter how much

780
00:49:45,584 --> 00:49:48,500
we wish there were more or wish there were less.

781
00:49:49,910 --> 00:49:53,454
It's that weird chasm that happens. I think for a lot of companies of like,

782
00:49:53,552 --> 00:49:57,106
I don't have quite enough work for a full time person. I don't

783
00:49:57,118 --> 00:50:00,186
have quite enough income for a full time person, but I need to hire a

784
00:50:00,188 --> 00:50:03,822
full time person because I can't keep going at the trajectory I am and continue

785
00:50:03,896 --> 00:50:08,118
to grow without that step. I think it's a really interesting

786
00:50:08,204 --> 00:50:11,818
problem that a lot of companies face and how they navigate that, I think varies

787
00:50:11,854 --> 00:50:15,738
wildly. But it's hard. And you're absolutely right about the

788
00:50:15,764 --> 00:50:19,326
necessity to focus. But there is

789
00:50:19,388 --> 00:50:23,646
value in the pain, for sure, because every

790
00:50:23,708 --> 00:50:27,570
hire that you make at this early stage is so critical.

791
00:50:28,010 --> 00:50:31,702
It's a huge hire. And unless you have some empathy

792
00:50:31,846 --> 00:50:35,418
for what that person is going to do and some understanding of what they

793
00:50:35,444 --> 00:50:39,030
need to do, how can you possibly vet someone who's going to do it?

794
00:50:39,140 --> 00:50:41,780
Well, if you don't have it,

795
00:50:42,170 --> 00:50:45,522
at least some exposure. So, yeah,

796
00:50:45,656 --> 00:50:49,126
it definitely pulled away from what you should be doing, but it sets

797
00:50:49,138 --> 00:50:51,270
you up better for scaling.

798
00:50:52,910 --> 00:50:57,550
You bet. Thank you for sharing that. Yeah. So smartest

799
00:50:57,610 --> 00:51:01,030
thing. Well, I mean, from it's all perspective,

800
00:51:01,090 --> 00:51:04,518
right? But from my perspective, I would

801
00:51:04,544 --> 00:51:07,942
say just doing, just jumping

802
00:51:07,966 --> 00:51:12,030
in and pulling the start up together and launching

803
00:51:13,850 --> 00:51:17,214
for me, that was the smartest thing I could have done on

804
00:51:17,312 --> 00:51:21,714
a number of different levels, personally and

805
00:51:21,812 --> 00:51:25,518
professionally, career wise, personally, because I know I

806
00:51:25,544 --> 00:51:29,514
would have regretted years down the line had I not

807
00:51:29,612 --> 00:51:33,318
tried you're explaining this when

808
00:51:33,464 --> 00:51:36,886
telling our three boys, okay, Dad's going to here's

809
00:51:36,898 --> 00:51:37,940
what he's going to do.

810
00:51:39,650 --> 00:51:43,146
Down in our previous home in the basement, we put a

811
00:51:43,148 --> 00:51:46,762
little office together here's the headquarters. And I'm explained,

812
00:51:46,786 --> 00:51:49,460
I said, you know what, if I don't try,

813
00:51:50,090 --> 00:51:53,060
there's no chance of success, right? Kind of back.

814
00:51:53,750 --> 00:51:57,298
Our then seven year old said, I have the quote sitting

815
00:51:57,334 --> 00:52:00,942
right here. It's like a genius quote. He said, well, never try,

816
00:52:01,076 --> 00:52:05,060
never fail, never succeed. And I was like blown away.

817
00:52:09,090 --> 00:52:13,020
I quick wrote it down. But seriously, for me

818
00:52:14,250 --> 00:52:16,860
that captured it the smartest thing.

819
00:52:19,150 --> 00:52:22,900
As entrepreneurs, I don't know that we do a lot of dumb things,

820
00:52:24,190 --> 00:52:26,750
but we do make mistakes.

821
00:52:28,090 --> 00:52:31,900
My biggest one was, I think,

822
00:52:32,470 --> 00:52:37,974
and this is like advice to my former self and to other entrepreneurs

823
00:52:38,082 --> 00:52:41,942
is get in front of customers

824
00:52:42,076 --> 00:52:45,218
as quickly and as often as possible.

825
00:52:45,304 --> 00:52:49,346
Well, we don't have a product. Who cares? Do you have a piece of paper

826
00:52:49,468 --> 00:52:52,130
and a pen or a pencil?

827
00:52:54,250 --> 00:52:57,782
There are a ton of different ways to or do you

828
00:52:57,796 --> 00:53:01,950
have like just a blank monitor

829
00:53:02,010 --> 00:53:05,738
where someone can kind of just show you what they might do or

830
00:53:05,764 --> 00:53:09,160
not even that? Let's just kind of cardboard it out.

831
00:53:09,850 --> 00:53:13,218
That kind of stuff would have really helped

832
00:53:13,254 --> 00:53:15,160
us further on down the line.

833
00:53:17,170 --> 00:53:21,590
We did it, but it was a little more painful. So I think I

834
00:53:21,640 --> 00:53:25,646
would have liked to have gotten in front of customers a

835
00:53:25,648 --> 00:53:29,114
whole lot sooner. But anyway, what are you going to do? Just be sure

836
00:53:29,152 --> 00:53:32,738
to get your provisional on file before saying too much. And this is an opportunity

837
00:53:32,824 --> 00:53:36,758
for a shameless plug around our On Sale Bar podcast and

838
00:53:36,784 --> 00:53:43,890
the annoying when to Show and when to Share blog post last

839
00:53:43,940 --> 00:53:47,574
one. So it's just if there's any

840
00:53:47,672 --> 00:53:51,274
major updates, news, exciting, upcoming things, your shameless

841
00:53:51,322 --> 00:53:54,834
plug time, things you'd like to share with

842
00:53:54,932 --> 00:53:58,374
our audience, and then where folks can go and learn more information about you,

843
00:53:58,412 --> 00:54:01,700
your company's products. For us,

844
00:54:03,170 --> 00:54:06,594
Everything this month is all about our launch, so we're about one month away

845
00:54:06,632 --> 00:54:10,282
from entering the market, so everything is just very exciting.

846
00:54:10,366 --> 00:54:13,566
Our production injection tooling is finished and

847
00:54:13,688 --> 00:54:17,130
bringing their first parts from the factory. We're getting

848
00:54:17,180 --> 00:54:21,774
our certification from the lab, the bacteria this

849
00:54:21,812 --> 00:54:25,678
month and everything is coming together. I found all the product photos.

850
00:54:25,714 --> 00:54:28,170
We're all very excited. My first trip to Guatemala,

851
00:54:29,270 --> 00:54:37,330
autofilter.com wonderful

852
00:54:38,070 --> 00:54:41,674
at Capnous. Our mission is to prevent lung diseases and save lives.

853
00:54:41,832 --> 00:54:45,314
We're here to create a future where we can help solve one of the deadliest

854
00:54:45,362 --> 00:54:49,082
addictions by addressing the behavioral component where no one else is. And we're

855
00:54:49,106 --> 00:54:52,860
already helping thousands of people successfully quit not doing so.

856
00:54:53,610 --> 00:54:57,106
I'm just really excited for everything that's coming up. We're in the process

857
00:54:57,168 --> 00:55:00,538
of raising so if you'd like to get involved with that regard, feel free to

858
00:55:00,564 --> 00:55:04,330
reach out. We're also looking to hire and we're also looking to

859
00:55:04,380 --> 00:55:08,158
build our community and find others who may resonate with our mission and

860
00:55:08,184 --> 00:55:11,986
what we're doing to work with us. So you can find us on our website

861
00:55:12,168 --> 00:55:15,926
just@mycapneous.com or anywhere on our social medias,

862
00:55:16,058 --> 00:55:18,960
which is just at mycapnest thank you.

863
00:55:20,070 --> 00:55:22,200
Awesome. Yeah, that's great.

864
00:55:26,110 --> 00:55:29,114
Continuing to iterate on

865
00:55:29,152 --> 00:55:32,802
our in market products. That's probably the biggest

866
00:55:32,886 --> 00:55:36,730
update we're

867
00:55:36,790 --> 00:55:40,930
looking forward. We're very excited about the Conversational

868
00:55:40,990 --> 00:55:44,840
AI piece. We're looking forward to that and

869
00:55:45,530 --> 00:55:48,214
getting more of our Ducks in a row along those lines.

870
00:55:48,262 --> 00:55:51,654
So that's a bit of an update to

871
00:55:51,692 --> 00:55:56,097
learn more. It's reallingua.com,

872
00:55:56,107 --> 00:55:59,000
reallingua.com.

873
00:55:59,690 --> 00:56:02,960
Thanks. That's awesome.

874
00:56:04,610 --> 00:56:08,600
We're still happy for and proud of

875
00:56:08,990 --> 00:56:12,320
all of you for what that's worth,

876
00:56:12,890 --> 00:56:16,638
when we pick the winners for the

877
00:56:16,664 --> 00:56:20,278
Rise Award, it's a very emotional,

878
00:56:20,314 --> 00:56:24,582
pain taking process, and we

879
00:56:24,596 --> 00:56:28,342
get a really great applicants. But you're

880
00:56:28,366 --> 00:56:31,710
all doing really very important missions.

881
00:56:32,330 --> 00:56:35,802
And it's great to see how much success you've had

882
00:56:35,996 --> 00:56:39,594
in such a short amount of time. And just

883
00:56:39,692 --> 00:56:43,040
know that we're during a hard time during a very hard time.

884
00:56:43,610 --> 00:56:46,700
You're playing on hard mode for sure.

885
00:56:47,270 --> 00:56:50,418
So just know we're some of your biggest fans and keep

886
00:56:50,444 --> 00:56:53,718
up the great work. Yeah, we'd love it. And if we can help in any

887
00:56:53,744 --> 00:56:57,742
other way, let us know. Open Guatemala

888
00:56:57,766 --> 00:57:06,442
for you, Teresa, too, if you need me to see

889
00:57:06,456 --> 00:57:09,118
if I can get my Spanish up to Snuff and then go put it to

890
00:57:09,144 --> 00:57:12,646
practice. Yeah, well, that's exactly

891
00:57:12,708 --> 00:57:16,402
what I'm going to do. As soon as this podcast goes, I have to get

892
00:57:16,416 --> 00:57:19,690
ready for my trip in three weeks. And if I see anybody vaping,

893
00:57:21,150 --> 00:57:22,500
slap it out of hand.

894
00:57:24,870 --> 00:57:28,318
Actually, I will challenge that. We actually try not to tell people what

895
00:57:28,344 --> 00:57:31,642
to do. We never want to say you shouldn't quit. I mean, we're just trying

896
00:57:31,656 --> 00:57:35,326
to help people who are looking to quit. It's a great point. Yeah,

897
00:57:35,388 --> 00:57:38,950
it's a really great point. Does play a big part in really

898
00:57:39,000 --> 00:57:42,778
changing the culture and understanding around it. That's true. Yes. People, I think you

899
00:57:42,804 --> 00:57:46,174
have to come to it on your own

900
00:57:46,332 --> 00:57:50,182
terms. Beating any addiction has to be

901
00:57:50,196 --> 00:57:54,094
a choice, a personal choice. Right. Somebody can't really for

902
00:57:54,132 --> 00:57:56,950
you. Exactly. Thank you for understanding.

903
00:57:58,890 --> 00:58:01,860
I love that you're aware of that and share that, too.

904
00:58:03,810 --> 00:58:07,450
It's a big enough market in itself. There's a lot of people wanting to quit.

905
00:58:08,130 --> 00:58:11,578
Okay. I think feeling let down, too by the fact. I mean, I would

906
00:58:11,604 --> 00:58:15,298
personally like if I had been a smoker and then changed to vaping because

907
00:58:15,324 --> 00:58:18,454
I thought that was going to be the solution, only to find out it's probably

908
00:58:18,492 --> 00:58:21,780
just as bad as what I was doing. I think I'd be really

909
00:58:22,230 --> 00:58:25,454
kind of mad and annoyed

910
00:58:25,502 --> 00:58:28,522
by that. Almost like misinformation. I mean,

911
00:58:28,536 --> 00:58:32,438
that was the information they had at the time. It was intentionally misdirecting.

912
00:58:32,474 --> 00:58:35,698
But to be like, here's a solution. Oh, wait, it turns out that solution is

913
00:58:35,724 --> 00:58:39,658
just as bad. So it's cool that there's an even better

914
00:58:39,684 --> 00:58:44,002
solution. That's truly a solution. Well, thanks, everybody, so very much.

915
00:58:44,136 --> 00:58:47,338
It's great getting to kind of have

916
00:58:47,364 --> 00:58:49,560
a little reunion with everybody.

917
00:58:51,330 --> 00:58:54,838
Thanks again. It was nice meeting both of you trees and Keith as

918
00:58:54,864 --> 00:58:58,570
well. It's a joy to be in this room together so virtual

919
00:59:01,090 --> 00:59:04,682
thanks everyone. Take care. Great to see you.

920
00:59:04,756 --> 00:59:06,650
Bye now. Bye.

921
00:59:07,810 --> 00:59:11,834
As mentioned in the intro, we're using this episode to launch the 2022

922
00:59:11,872 --> 00:59:15,374
Rise award for the selected applicant. We'll work closely with you

923
00:59:15,412 --> 00:59:19,338
and your team of inventors to provide one of the following either a free provisional

924
00:59:19,374 --> 00:59:23,454
US patent application or $5,000 towards a non provisional

925
00:59:23,502 --> 00:59:27,002
US patent application. The only requirement is that you must have

926
00:59:27,016 --> 00:59:29,834
an impactful innovation that you want to share with the world.

927
00:59:29,932 --> 00:59:33,906
We welcome applicants from all subject matter areas and zip codes.

928
00:59:34,038 --> 00:59:37,634
Eligible applications will be reviewed by an internal panel based on

929
00:59:37,672 --> 00:59:40,866
equal weighting of technology, maturity, market relevance,

930
00:59:40,938 --> 00:59:44,726
economic impact and societal impact. We're going to begin taking

931
00:59:44,788 --> 00:59:48,194
applications today. To learn more about this award and apply,

932
00:59:48,292 --> 00:59:52,046
please visit Rise Upwithaurora.com. We'll also have a link in

933
00:59:52,048 --> 00:59:55,202
the show notes. Good luck and we can't wait to see your application.

934
00:59:55,396 --> 00:59:58,598
All right, that's all for today folks. Thanks for listening and remember to check

935
00:59:58,624 --> 01:00:01,614
us out@aurorapatents.com for more great podcasts,

936
01:00:01,662 --> 01:00:05,414
blogs and videos covering all things patent strategy and if you're an agent

937
01:00:05,452 --> 01:00:08,282
or attorney and would like to be part of the discussion or an inventor with

938
01:00:08,296 --> 01:00:12,950
a topic you'd like to hear discussed, email us at podcast@aurorapatins.com

939
01:00:13,120 --> 01:00:16,826
do remember that this podcast does not constitute legal advice and until next time

940
01:00:16,888 --> 01:00:18,200
keep calm and patents on.