TECHNET Archives

February 2006

TechNet@IPC.ORG

Options: Use Monospaced Font
Show Text Part by Default
Show All Mail Headers

Message: [<< First] [< Prev] [Next >] [Last >>]
Topic: [<< First] [< Prev] [Next >] [Last >>]
Author: [<< First] [< Prev] [Next >] [Last >>]

Print Reply
Subject:
From:
Joe Fjelstad <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
TechNet E-Mail Forum <[log in to unmask]>, [log in to unmask]
Date:
Tue, 28 Feb 2006 13:25:57 EST
Content-Type:
text/plain
Parts/Attachments:
text/plain (95 lines)
Greetings all,

I took a look the other day at US patents to see what was happening on the
lead-free front and senses the size of the minefield was being laid out for
future legal battles as lead-free products are being rolled out.

I did a quick search using the limiters of:

Lead free OR leadfree OR lead-free AND solder AND  circuit,

It is admittedly not perfect but it was done in a manner to to try and  focus
the search on electronics related filings and hopefully filter out  things
like paint, gasoline and pipe.

The same search was performed for each of the 14 years back to  1992 which is
about when the lead-free campaign began.

Here are the results:

Year         No. of  patents

1992     =      3

1993     =      9

1994     =      8

1995     =      21

1996     =      11

1997     =      13

1998     =      20

1999     =      25

2000     =      32


2001     =      58

2002     =      92



2003     =      135

2004     =      165

2005     =      159

Total     =      751

It appears that there was an early surge around the time the US  government
first expressed a willingness to listen to the argument for a  band on lead and
then a slow down that roughly corresponds with US government's  realization
that there was no scientific evidence that lead in electronic solder  was a
problem and then another surge in patents that has accelerated since  the EU made
known their intentions.



Now here is the kicker...

There are more than 1100 published US patent applications currently  pending
issue using the same search criteria. The number of suppressed  US patent
fillings and foreign patents would surely have added  significantly to the tally.


Best wishes,
Joe













---------------------------------------------------
Technet Mail List provided as a service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8e
To unsubscribe, send a message to [log in to unmask] with following text in
the BODY (NOT the subject field): SIGNOFF Technet
To temporarily halt or (re-start) delivery of Technet send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet NOMAIL or (MAIL)
To receive ONE mailing per day of all the posts: send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet Digest
Search the archives of previous posts at: http://listserv.ipc.org/archives
Please visit IPC web site http://www.ipc.org/contentpage.asp?Pageid=4.3.16 for additional information, or contact Keach Sasamori at [log in to unmask] or 847-615-7100 ext.2815
-----------------------------------------------------

ATOM RSS1 RSS2