New take on new ideas

The brainchild of Lourence Greyvenstein, an inventor in his own right, and Internet entrepreneur Wayne de Nobrega, the new magazine is aptly named New Ideas.

"We believe New Ideaswill inspire readers' creativity and possibly help them to grow their businesses. More importantly, perhaps, the magazine is fun, giving readers a taste of the ingenuity of people from around the world. Some of the ideas included in the magazine involve complex scientific, medical or engineering advances; others are of the simple 'why didn't I think of that' variety," says Greyvenstein.

"What they all have in common, however, is that they all seem to have commercial potential - and in today's world, that's probably the most important characteristic of a successful new idea."

Launch edition

The launch edition features 75 inventions from around the world, including South Africa, for which an initial patent registration is pending from the Patent Co-operation Treaty (PCT). South Africa is a signatory to the PCT, which provides a unified procedure for filing patent applications to protect inventions

In addition to an illustration and description of the idea, as well as easy-to-interpret graphs showing the results of a dipstick, online market survey, readers are provided with the details they need to contact the inventors directly should they wish to obtain the commercial rights to manufacture and distribute the product.

"This enables readers to identify those that can expand their business, help them start a new business or provide their employers with new opportunities," he explains and points out that Patentdata does not get involved in negotiations between inventors and would-be investors. In fact, Patentdata is not involved with the inventors at all: inventors are not informed about their inclusion in the magazine and most will only find out about this when a potential investor contacts them.

Greyvenstein has first-hand experience of the complexities involved in bringing New Ideas to market. He invented and patented a unique plastic bag and granted the Glad Products Company a licence to manufacture this idea in 1990.

Today, his invention is sold in the USA, Canada, Australia, the UK and across Europe and he is using the magazine to plough back some of the royalties he receives from Glad to help bring together other investors and entrepreneurial business people.

Difficult to keep track

According to Greyvenstein, about 100 000 applications for patents are filed with the PCT every year. There is no way an entrepreneur looking for a good commercial idea to exploit can keep track of them all, let alone research them all.

Just more than two years ago, the idea to use the power and interactivity of the Internet to explore the commercial viability of new designs that have not yet been developed for commercial use was born.

"We concentrate on ideas filed with the PCT by individuals rather than businesses and publish four of these in a summarised, easy-to-understand format on the Internet* every day. Viewers - most of whom have no real commercial interest in the products but just enjoy the ingenuity of the designs - are asked to comment on their perception of the new ideas' market potential. They are then presented with a free Market Feedback Report on the design they have reviewed."