In order to illustrate what a patent application can look like, we have used an invention that you might recognize: a tetrahedron-shaped milk packaging made of paper material, which was invented in the 1940s and became the basis for the company Tetra Pak. The method of manufacturing the packaging was very special and, as such, was patented.

If we imagine that the invention of the tetrahedron packaging was new today, the application could look like this:

Packaging for liquids, in Swedish (pdf 122 kB)

We would like to emphasize that this is just a simple and general example of how an application can be formulated. In the brochure “How to apply for a patent”, you can read more about how an application develops.

It is easy to make the mistake of wording a patent claim so that the scope of protection is narrower than it needs to be. Consider our packaging example. What would have happened if we had worded our first claim like this instead:

“Milk packaging, characterized by that a tubular material through compression and closure forms a tetrahedron-shaped holder.”

As the packaging can be used for other liquids than just milk, it is unnecessary to bind yourself to that by limiting the title to “milk packaging”. Our claim is for a packaging for “liquids” instead and therefore covers other liquids such as water, soup or wine. In that way, the claim is adapted to a larger market.

Possible further developments of the invention would be, for example, to coat the paper with a waterproof layer to reduce the risk of leakage, or alternative forms of the packaging, for example, a brick-shaped packaging. In reality, of course, all of this is already well known.

You can also use the Swedish Patent Database to see how others have formulated themselves in their technical areas.

Swedish Patent Database (external website)