Defending a Patent: Lessons from Hal Philipp’s Entrepreneurial Journey
Today Robert J. Marks and Bradley Norris continue their conversation with Hal Philipp, inventor of the modern touchscreen. In Part 1, we covered several of Hal’s earlier inventions, including the creation of the charge transfer sensor. Today, we’ll be hearing about how the sensor led to touchscreens as we know them today and what happened in their aftermath. Philipp also discusses the hard lessons he learned through a difficult relationship with Apple, Inc. After licensing Philipp’s capacitive sensor technology, the Cupertino tech giant left him in the lurch, and Philipp learned that when you get a patent for something, it’s really just a license to sue when the idea gets stolen. Philipp shares his remarkable David and Goliath story.
Additional Resources
- Part 1 of this conversation: The Accidental Inventor: An Interview with Hal Philipp
- Watch this interview on YouTube: Stories and Startup Tips from Hal Philipp, Inventor of the Touch Screen
- Hal Philipp’s publication with Robert J. Marks II
- H. Philipp and Robert J. Marks II “Microprocessor based light bridge sensors,” Industrial Optical Sensing, SPIE vol.961, pp.28-34, 1988 (The Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers, Bellingham, WA)
- Robert J. Marks II at Discovery Institute
- Bradley Norris at Baylor University
- Hal Philipp at Michigan Tech
