What if a physicist went back to high school?
Read a sample and find out!
“Paul! Telephone,” my mom called.
I hurried from my room, expecting to hear Jeryl’s voice. We had gotten in the habit of chatting on the phone a couple of times a week, since we mostly saw each other on Fridays or Saturdays.
“Hello?”
“Is this Paul Taylor?” I was surprised to hear a man’s voice.
“Yes, it is. May I help you?”
The man chuckled. “Maybe, but I’d like to think that I can help you. My name is Steve Abraham, from the law firm of Powell, Anderson, and Schmidt. I’d like to arrange a time to meet you and discuss your patent application titled ‘Methods for electro-hydraulic control of a vehicle via embedded microprocessors’. You are the author of that patent, correct?”
“Yes, sir, I am.” A lawyer had already found me. He must have someone in the patent office, since I had only gotten a form letter back that my application had been received and a patent number assigned so that I could legally claim “patent pending” status on my invention.
“I apologize for calling so late in the day, but I could not reach you earlier. My firm would like to discuss purchase terms with you regarding your patent application. How soon could we arrange a meeting with you or your attorney?”
“Um, how about I get your contact information and have my attorney call you back?”
“That would be excellent.” He gave me his phone number and mailing address and asked that any correspondence be marked for his attention. “Thank you for your time, Mr. Taylor,” he finished. “I look forward to meeting you.”
I hung up the phone and started laughing softly.
“Mom?” I called. I had no idea how she would react to this. “I need to find a lawyer.”
“Call me Jim, please.” Jim Daniels said as he held open his office door for my mother and me. He struck me as a southern gentleman, even though he had no drawl in his voice. With his suit jacket, tie and full head of silver hair, he embodied ‘genteel’. He smiled at us both as we stepped into his office and took seats at a medium conference table near the windows.
“Can I offer you anything to drink?” he asked. “Coffee, tea, water?”
“Tea would be nice,” my mother said.
“Just water, please.”
He stuck his head out the door and said, “Kelly, can you bring in some tea and water, please?” He closed the door and then joined us at the table.
“So, you need an attorney because of some patents you’ve filed?”
“Just one so far, but I’ve actually submitted seven patent applications.”
His eyes got wider, and he looked at my mother. “And you’re how old?”
“I’ll be sixteen next month.”
“He’s always been a very bright boy,” my mother added. “I thought this was some sort of wild dream of his, but when that other lawyer called and said they wanted to buy his application, I realized we needed an expert to make sure he was protected.”
The attorney nodded and sat back. “Well, you’ve come to the right place. I’ve been an attorney for twenty years and have handled patent and copyright cases almost every year.”
I knew he was qualified and considered one of the best attorneys in the area. His practice appeared humble and small, but Mom had done some research. He was on retainer with State Farm Insurance and Caterpillar, two of the largest companies in down state Illinois, for patent and copyright cases.
“So, who contacted you?”
I gave him Mr. Abraham’s information. He wrote it down carefully on a yellow legal pad and then tapped his pen against his lips. “Powell, Anderson, and Schmidt is a firm in Detroit. They handle quite a bit of business for General Motors. They don’t look at small patents. What exactly did you file?”
I pulled out a copy of the application as well as the registration letter and receipt from the U.S. Patent Office and handed them to him. He separated them into three stacks in front of him and glanced at each before turning his attention to the patent application. It was almost two inches thick, with all its drawings folded behind it.
“‘Methods for electro-hydraulic control of a vehicle via embedded microprocessors’, what does that mean in lawyer terms?” He asked.
“It means you can have very fine control of the steering mechanism for a vehicle to improve safety and performance by having small computers assist in translating your driving commands to the wheels. Think of it as power steering, powered up.”
“And how did you come up with this idea?” he asked.
I shrugged. “I’ve always liked cars and tinkering. When I read about the new microprocessors being made by Intel and Motorola, I wondered what they could do. I started playing with ideas like this one and using them to monitor and improve fuel efficiency and braking. There are a ton of applications for cars and trucks. The military has talked about ‘fly-by-wire’ in jets for a couple of years. This is similar to that but applied to cars and trucks.”
He started to ask another question when the door opened and his receptionist, Kelly, brought in a tray with three cups on it. She set it on the table and passed the tea to my mom, handed me a large glass of ice water, and gave Mr. Daniels a large, chipped, cup of coffee.
“Thank you, Kelly.”
“Yes, thank you, ma’am.” Mom smiled as Kelly did a double take and shot me a look. Jim gave a large belly laugh at her expression. I felt my cheeks flush. I had not meant to embarrass her.
“Paul, this is my daughter, Kelly. She has probably never been called ma’am by a client before. She works here after school and in the summer. She wants to follow in her old man’s footsteps. Kelly, say hi to Paul Taylor. You’ll most likely see a bit of him over the coming months.”
The young woman blushed and then gave me a tight smile and brief head-nod. She had long blonde hair, pulled back into a ponytail, blue eyes and a nice figure hidden behind pants and a blazer that were just a little too old for her. She was probably twenty-something, and I bet she was popular with the guys at law school. She’d turn law professors’ heads with a batting of her lashes. Of course, she was still decades younger than me in one sense and five or six years older in the other.
“Kelly, I imagine Paul will be a very intriguing client. Why don’t you join us so you can listen and learn a bit?” Kelly blushed again and then sat down at the end of the table where she could easily watch all of us. She pulled out a small bound notebook and fished a pen from behind her ear. Her expression feigned disinterest, maybe a little superiority, as if my ideas and I were not really worth her time.
“So, you’ll take me on as a client?” I asked after taking a sip of my water.
Jim glanced at the patent application again. “Paul, if you did all this work in the past year and have six more of similar breadth and capability, I would be happy to take you and your mother on as clients.”
“Me? Why me?” Mom asked.
“Paul is still a minor. He can’t legally enter into a binding contract. You can as his parent. One of the first things we’ll do is create a corporate identity to protect you and him and all of his hard work. That will also help with taxes.”
Mom shook her head. “That sounds like a lot of work to make one sale.”
Mr. Daniels’ laugh filled the room again. “Mrs. Taylor, even if it were only selling this one idea, based on who is interested it is at least a million-dollar deal. Once I have a chance to fully read this and think about it, you could be looking at a lot more than that.”
It was Mom’s turn to sit dumbstruck.
“In fact, I would recommend against selling outright. We’ll need to look at what terms we would license this for. You would make less up-front, but if the idea catches on and is cost-effective, you could easily get five to fifty dollars for every car they put this into.”
Kelly took a sharp breath and looked at me with renewed interest.
I smiled.
“So, it is critical that we do everything just right.” Jim picked up his pen and began writing as he spoke. “I would recommend a corporation rather than a trust, that way you can more easily draw on funds for expenses. We’ll need to do a thorough review of prior art on this patent and review all your other work as well. Only then will we contact Mr. Abraham.”
He looked up. “Kelly, it’s going to be a long couple of weeks, and you will learn a lot. I’ll want you to draft the articles of incorporation today so we can file them on Monday. Paul, you can’t be president, but you can be the chairman of the board of directors. You’ll obviously contribute your patent applications to the corporation in exchange for shares in the company. Mrs. Taylor, you can be president since you can execute contracts legally. We’ll need to find at least one more board member to act as secretary.”
“Can’t you do that?” My mother asked.
“No, but I’ll be listed as general counsel.”
“What about Kelly? Is she over twenty-one?” I asked.
His daughter blushed again. It was a cute blush.
“She is, and she can, if you want her to.”
I nodded.
“How do we pay you for all this?”
Jim’s laugh was growing on me. He had a joy for life. “Stock for my retainer and once we have cash-flow, you’ll pay me. Let’s say we form the company with one thousand shares. You take them for your contribution and give your mother and me and Kelly as much as you see fit, but always keep at least five hundred and one in your name. You have voting control that way.”
I nodded, understanding. “Let’s write it up, giving you and Kelly fifty each and my mom one hundred.”
I saw Kelly scowl. Her dad noticed it as well.
“That sounds about right. If we value this first patent at one million, and you are starting with a thousand shares, each share is worth a thousand dollars. That makes my retainer worth fifty thousand dollars. Not bad for a day’s work,” he said with a sharp look at his daughter.
Kelly’s eyes got wide, and she at least had the grace to blush.
This is a pair of scenes from chapter six. Read a sample on Amazon to start from the beginning.
Charlie Forêt 