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Patents are usually not worth the paper they are written on, except as a means of establishing a date for "prior art".
For over 20 years I've been trying to think of a way to have on packets of frozen food a means of showing whether the cold chain has been broken at any time between the manufacturer and the retail cabinet. This is easy at a prohibitive price (50 cents upwards), which would make the cost of the goods non-competitive.
A few days ago, I had a Eureka moment and I believe I have an answer to this enigma. I would guestimate that the materials cost would be <1-2 cents each. It would require a small machine installed over the conveyor carrying the already frozen boxes to the cartons. My guestimate is that such a machine would cost about $7,500-10,000 in small batches. It would also require a small modification to the machine which forms the boxes.
My problems are:
- I'm old and in poor health, thus have no will to develop the idea
- I'm retired and have no machines or suchlike to develop a prototype
- I have no proof of the viability sufficient to justify the enormous expense and hassle of a search for prior art before patenting the idea (principle and machine), at least until a manual prototype was shown to work
- I have no longer any industrial contacts of potentially interested partners
- I can not reveal any details to any third party before patenting without a watertight privileged confidentiality agreement
As I see it:
Each cardboard packet (will not be viable for plastic bag packing of veggies, for example) containing frozen food would have an indication whether, at any time, the temperature has exceeded a given temperature, say, -15°C (can be any temperature). The reaction time of the indicator would be seconds after the contents reached the critical temperature. The indicator would be non-reversible, ie no one could reset it without going to a lot of expense and time to do so.
Consumers could see, at a glance, whether the food in the retail cabinet was fit to eat: retailers could refuse shipments that had not been properly refrigerated at all times.
I seek an entrepreneur who may be interested in taking over the idea, either for a one-off cash sum (preferable) or as a partner with a fixed sum royalty for each system sold.
Anyone interested?
For over 20 years I've been trying to think of a way to have on packets of frozen food a means of showing whether the cold chain has been broken at any time between the manufacturer and the retail cabinet. This is easy at a prohibitive price (50 cents upwards), which would make the cost of the goods non-competitive.
A few days ago, I had a Eureka moment and I believe I have an answer to this enigma. I would guestimate that the materials cost would be <1-2 cents each. It would require a small machine installed over the conveyor carrying the already frozen boxes to the cartons. My guestimate is that such a machine would cost about $7,500-10,000 in small batches. It would also require a small modification to the machine which forms the boxes.
My problems are:
- I'm old and in poor health, thus have no will to develop the idea
- I'm retired and have no machines or suchlike to develop a prototype
- I have no proof of the viability sufficient to justify the enormous expense and hassle of a search for prior art before patenting the idea (principle and machine), at least until a manual prototype was shown to work
- I have no longer any industrial contacts of potentially interested partners
- I can not reveal any details to any third party before patenting without a watertight privileged confidentiality agreement
As I see it:
Each cardboard packet (will not be viable for plastic bag packing of veggies, for example) containing frozen food would have an indication whether, at any time, the temperature has exceeded a given temperature, say, -15°C (can be any temperature). The reaction time of the indicator would be seconds after the contents reached the critical temperature. The indicator would be non-reversible, ie no one could reset it without going to a lot of expense and time to do so.
Consumers could see, at a glance, whether the food in the retail cabinet was fit to eat: retailers could refuse shipments that had not been properly refrigerated at all times.
I seek an entrepreneur who may be interested in taking over the idea, either for a one-off cash sum (preferable) or as a partner with a fixed sum royalty for each system sold.
Anyone interested?
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