I'll confess to a) being a lawyer, and b) knowing basically nothing about intellectual property law, as it's well outside my practice area.

We all know the story about about Suntour's 1964 patent on the slant-parallelogram derailleur, how Shimano waited decades for the patent to expire, then incorporate it into their early SIS systems, and eventually crushed Suntour and conquered the world.

So why does it seem like this sort of patent-related exclusivity didn't happen with other cycling technologies? Campy and Suntour both came out with indexing (though less successful) right after Shimano, and Campy introduced Ergos right after STI shifters. Bottom bracket interfaces, hub types, etc all seem to move across the industry in one big sweep now, across all the major manufacturers. What gives?

my guess is the devil is in the details.

Similar results/function with different ways of getting to it.

A slant parallelogram is very distinctive, very specific, not much redesign to avoid patent issues can be done, until after patent protection ends.

Shifting from brake levers is probably too broad a concept to patent.

STI vs Ergo .... the original versions had different user interfaces (innner lever vs sidebutton) and having never been brave enough to take them apart I am guessing the mechanisms are sufficiently different that they are covered by different patents.

(New) Lawyer here. Don't know much about IP law, but my desk chair assumption is that the later technologies you mentioned aren't similar enough to break any patent. EG- Campy's ergo works differently than Shimano's STI so Campy isn't violating any IP. Whereas for Shimano to get a derailer to shift as good as Suntour's they had to copy Suntour's slant-parallelogram design.

Again, a desk chair assumption, but hopefully it'll get the conversation going.

I read a book on the history of the bicycle* (the title escapes me at the moment) but upon the invention of the safety bicycle, just about everything that you could patent was patented and defended vigorously. In this day and age where there are jerks out there trying to patent the use of the tab key to flip between text boxes, it surprises me that there are not more patent trolls involved in every incremental improvement to bicycle equipment and performance.


*Man do you have to slog through that stuff. It's amazing how boring a topic you'd think you'd love can be!

I should look this up since I don't clearly recall, but I suspect indexed shifting had been done decades before, and any pertinent patents had long expired. This sort of revival of old ideas seems to happen more often than not. Dual pivot brakes are a good example. I'm not sure if it applies to STI, or what went on there. I remember Campy and Shimano introduced competing systems at the same time.

I'm not a lawyer and it's been years since I took a patent law class, but IIRC the traditional hurdle for a patent is that the idea must be novel and not obvious. The slant parallelogram derailleur was clearly novel and original, and therefore patentable. These days it seems like the USPTO barely examines anything, but that's a different subject.

Indexed gearing was on the market decades before Shimano or Campy did it. Maybe they couldn't lay claim to it. You know they would have if they could.
(Hercules 3 speed Herailleur, Patent applied 1948)

It was my understanding that Shimano patented the cable coming off the insides of the brifters so that Campy could not copy that feature and setting back Campy probably a couple of years trying to get an aero-cabled version to work well. (I find that amusing if that is true. For me, aero levers were a both ergonomic and esthetic breakthrough. That Shimano would use patent law to force Campy to do it right? Funny! And after enough years of goofy cables, Shimano finally did the same thing.

Ben

IANAL, but "prior art," perhaps? Sturmey-Archer had indexed shifting as far back as 1903 (although is wasn't with a derailleur), and SunTour had a short-lived indexed shifting system in the late 60s and early 70s that was only marketed in Japan.

I have a Lucchini indexed shifting derailleur from the 40's.

I've been involved with a number of patented products.

In the US today, the reason to get a patent is not to protect your idea, design, invention or product from someone using your work but... to keep someone from patenting your work and suing you for infringement!

A patent needs to be defended against infringement otherwise it looses it's protective value.

I'm currently involved with a product that a patent has been applied for. The design is not novel but the patent is based on novel usage.

In the US the expression "Patent Pending" appears on a lot of products but does not protect an invention until the actual patent is published and/or issued.

The use of the term "patent pending" or "patent applied for" is permitted as long as a patent application has actually been filed. If these terms are used when no patent application has been filed it's considered a deceptive act and can result in substantial fines.

BTW, The abbreviation SGDG appears on a lot of French components. It stands for "Sans Garantie Du Gouvernement" which means without government guarantees... I.E. no governmental protection!

Columbo moment...

The Japanese have traditionally avoided litigations preferring to resolve conflict in other ways. In Japan, companies rarely sue each other (Suntour vs. Shimano)!


verktyg

Chas.

Certainly there are a lot of wicked computer lawsuits, but one of the reason we have Microsoft, Linux, and Apple operating systems is there seems to be at least some tolerance for doing the same thing in different ways. I.E. All new source code.

I have no doubt the divergence between Shimano Campagnolo, and SRAM shifters were all related to proprietary design issues. And, as patents expire, no doubt there will be some amount of convergence.

For bike shops and mechanics, and even manufactures, it is nice to have some commonality of designs. For example setting brake posts at about the same place.

As a consumer, I find the differences in derailleur pull, and cassette spacing is just a hassle.

At one company where I used to work we had the corporate patent lawyers come in a give us a seminar. It was nominally about how much code software engineers could or couldn't use and where it could or couldn't come from. For example, you shouldn't borrow from Open Source code because that means all your code comes under their use agreement, which means your is now open and unprotected too.

Several counter-intuitive points came out of the seminar.

With stuff like software or processing algorithms which can be tough to reverse-engineer, it could be better not to patent. A patent application requires publication of the details, and sometimes just keeping details hidden is better protection. (FWIW I could never convince my bosses to pursue patents on any of the handful of stuff I developed. I think mostly it seemed like too much trouble to them.)

A bigger reason to patent wasn't to protect ideas but to be a preemptive counter-strike or deterrent against a rival company. In this case it was taking out several patents on industrial-design variations of the rival's big products. The intent wasn't to develop those variations but to have a potential lawsuit in the arsenal to sue them in case they sued us for something. To my mind it completely missed the point of patents but what the hey, big companies with lawyers will do whatever they want.

I'd give you advice, but it would be in billable hours.

Suntour's slant parallelogram patent, US Patent No. 3,364,762 to Tetsuo Maeda (according to Disraeli Gears: SunTour Gran-Prix derailleur ) is available for download at GOOGLE PATENTS, which is a good place to browse if you are curious. Disraeli gears has a copy as well. The reasons for a patent's allowance or rejection--the arguments back-and-forth between the patent applicant and the patent examiner--are in the "prosecution history." For older patents, the prosecution history is not easily available, if it is available at all. For more recent patents, the prosecution history is (usually) publicly available at "PUBLIC PAIR": Check the Filing Status of Your Patent Application | USPTO As noted above, the "devil is in the details!"

Everyone, probably as a result of Frank Berto comments in The Dancing Chain, likes to make reference to SunTour's 1969 Five-Speed Click system is a predecessor to SIS. However, Shimano had an patented indexed system in 1966. The indexing was in the lever, like SIS, and it was designed for use with a 3 cog freewheel.

Everybody also seems to consider the adaption of the slant parallelogram as the critical piece of the puzzle to finally making indexing work properly. While there were several important factors including the slant parallelogram, B-pivot spring and computer optimized geometry, the most critical component was Shimano's Centeron jockey pulley. The built-in lateral play compensated for the cumulative error in the rest of the system and provided the necessary self-centering of the chain with respect to the cog. IMO, this is the real reason why SIS worked better than Syncro, AccuShift or previous indexed systems.

In the tech world, particularly with hardware, product decisions are made based on the best/cheapest licensing path. It is assumed you aren't looking for a patent, but just a less expensive way to product something. So you negotiate with whoever's patent/licensing rights you are likely to awake if you go a certain way in your design in order to keep your cost of goods down. I imagine the same thing happens with many cycling products - see MIPS helmet technology as an example.

Yes, they have a different culture, as my brother in law explained to me. He was General Counsel (chief lawyer) for a multi-national Japanese company. He and most of the legal department were in the US headquarters because most legal activity happens here, not in Japan. They generally don't sue there. But being an international company, they did have need to protect their intellectual property.

I wonder if patents are one reason they say that nothing new is ever invented, just old stuff is recycled.

For example, here is a 1979 disc brake bicycle.
Ryan's Bliggity Blog: 1979 Free Spirit Ten Speed

And, undoubtedly there would be more precedent for disc brakes in the auto world.

But, the disc brakes of the early years were heavy and clunky and never took hold.

20 years later, there was a huge boom in disc brakes, with everyone who was anyone making a bike with disc brakes.

BINGO!

Lateral float - side to side play - on the upper pulley is the secret to effective index shifting. A chain will tend to self center on a sprocket if it's not being pushed to one side or the other.

I figured this out trouble shooting a shifting problem on a used 1987 Centurion Ironman with a Shimano 105 RD. It was my first experience with Shimano down tube indexing levers (used Deore thumbies for years). After trying several different chains and switching cassettes I found that the bushing hole in the upper pulley was wallowed out so much that it would rock side to side about 15°-20°. After I replaced the pulley everything worked perfect!

After that, I modified the top pulley on a Simplex SX610 RD. It index shifts an 8 speed cassette perfectly! I had to file a little off of the inside travel stop to get it to cover the width of the cassette. I'm using Sachs-Huret Rival indexing levers which are just about identical to Shimano SIS 8 speed levers.



I modify the upper pulleys on a lot of RDs that I install or overhaul now. The pulley float allows for easier shifting with friction levers without having to "trim" them after shifting. No more 2 forward and 1 back with Campy NR/SR levers and RDs.

verktyg

Chas.

What you don't say! That's brilliant, if it really works! Could I use an SIS upper pulley for a test, or is there some roadblock to doing that vs butchering my precious Shimano, Suntour & Campy vintage pulleys?

The real simple answer is patent holders develop new variations of their application and patent those before the exist one ends. That keeps competitors at bay.

That's because until fairly recently the US had a first to invent rather than a first to file operational philosophy. So all you needed was some proof you had an idea first even though others might have filed before you. One benefit with patent pending is you put competitors on notice. If they objected and showed they invented it first, you minimize your expenses and could just drop pursuing it.

Note Shimano was DEVELOPING their SIS system before the patent ran out, then jumped, Fast!
Index shifting had quite a bit of "prior art", if you look at what Shimano did that was patentable, it was not much till the integrated brake/shift lever and Hyperglide system.

Suntour and Campagnolo's index systems were patent conflict free of the other players.
Campagnolo Ergo shifters had paintable features, but dodged the Shimano patents.

I beg to differ on bottom bracket and crank attachment standards, plenty of unique systems, and a few "open" systems that never were fully adopted, the "not invented here" syndrome. The latest is a threaded standard that Argonaut is a developer in, that may be semi open source.
The earlier threading systems were Nationality based, no real patentable or patented features.

The Shimano freehub was a rework of much earlier efforts, not much new. That is why Suntour and Campagnolo moved in with no problem.
I do find it interesting that SRAM is interchangeable with Shimano somewhat. Campagnolo being very proud, probably just did not want to "copy"

Axle diameters and locknut widths are interesting, here a practical "gentleman's agreement" has taken hold.
Even the now common 11 speed dimensions are so close that interchangeability is back, not perfect, but tolerable.

The jury is out on disc brakes and through axle types… there are ISO standards but time will tell if they will stick.
Volagi disc brake road bikes tried 130mm rear wheel spacing, now moving to 135 as the parts makers have spoken, for example.

I think there is more in flux than ever before.

Rotor is bringing out a hydraulic shifting system, the patents on cable and electronic shifting are so tied up there was really no where to go but different.

BTW, Campagnolo has patented a brake hydraulic cylinder system where the components are buried inside the handlebar…. Campagnolo handlebars? Repechage predicts...

Shimano fixed all the problems with indexing at one time before putting it on the market. There was much more to it than a rear mech. Campy & Suntour were not prepared for the change and took years to come out with competing system. Campy was lucky because it already had such a loyal following. Saunter not so much.
The story is out there on the net for all to see.

I'm no lawyer but I hold several patents. And what it really boils down to is how broad is your claim. The broader the claim, the more likely you can go after infringers. The broad claim of "a slant", versus a narrow claim like "a slant of 30 degrees". I can get around the latter claim by making it a slant of 35 degrees but I don't get around the former claim.

Currently Segway is suing some hoverboard manufacturers for infringement and if you read Segway's claim, it is pretty broad. Again, I'm no lawyer but I think Segway has a pretty good case.

So as time moves on with a technology, it is harder and harder to get a broad claim because it has already been done. So you make you claims more narrow which then are easier to get around.