Id like to know if Mazzer burrs are protected by patents since companies like ssp are making exact copies of them. It seems like no restrictions what do you guys think?

https://euipo.europa.eu/ohimportal/en

Search here.

Most patents have a lifetime of 20 years, so older burr designs may already be off-patent. I'd be surprised if some of the new burr innovations were not under patent protection, especially if they are shown to have an advantageous geometry that delivers a desired particle distribution, etc.

I wonder what you might be able to patent for a burr? Maybe a design patent if the burrs are visually distinctive but burrs have been around so ling, you'd have to come up with something significant and it might end up being so specific it's trivially easy to change it enough to avoid infringement and not change functionality. Consider trying to patent the knife edge on a knife versus trying to get a design patent on the shape of a knife.

Ira

It seems like the Kafatek person would want to patent the Shuriken burrs if he could since he's so protective of them but I see no mention of patent pending on the website.

It should be said that you can't just patent anything.

Companies like Mazzer, SSP, Kafatek, etc. would have to prove that there is something novel with the design of their burrs and substantiate it with supporting claims. Burrs have been around for a long time.

Anything that is prior art (stuff out there in the world or previous expired patents) that may be similar would prevent them from successfully being able to make claims and file a patent.

Additionally it must be a non-obvious to an individual skilled in the art (product engineers, coffee "experts", etc.). Just because something is new doesn't mean it's non-obvious. Given that burrs are a relatively simple device, I think it would be extremely difficult to patent a burr based on tooth pattern alone because there would be just a ton of prior art out in the world.

With regards to Kafatek, to me it looks like he's being cautious and protective as much as is practical and taking a first-to-market approach. I really think that's the best strategy here. I'd be somewhat surprised if he filed a patent for many reasons. Even if you do manage to file one, it takes even more resources to protect them should you need to file an infringement suit. The damages you'd be able to claim might be relatively small in the specialty home coffee grinder market.

Edit:
Here are a couple of expired Chinese patents where they're making claims on burr geometry, which is quite interesting:
Ghost burr? https://patents.google.com/patent/TWI58 ... tting+disk
https://patents.google.com/patent/CN285 ... ding+disks

I found these expired US patents from early 1900s interesting and relevant to this discussion:
https://patents.google.com/patent/US782293A/en
https://patents.google.com/patent/US1026818A/en

2NDCRACKER wrote:Id like to know if Mazzer burrs are protected by patents since companies like ssp are making exact copies of them. It seems like no restrictions what do you guys think?

Which Mazzer burrs does SSP make exact copies of? I wasn't aware of any. As others have noted, SSP burrs are much closer to Mahlkonig burrs, but still modified from those designs.

And yeah, I don't think there's meaningful patent protection.

on ssp website in the burrs descriptions for example they say its a mazzer robur.

From the marketing material from the grinder companies they put alot of work into R&D to develop burrs im curious why all this 'effort' isnt protected as it seems quite common for burrs to be copied by others. i guess its ok to get the copies lol