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PowerPatent
PowerPatent is generative AI drafting software for patent applications, sold to patent attorneys, agents and the inventors who work with them. A user uploads an invention summary, a set of claims and annotated drawings, and the software produces a first draft: an auto-generated background, a preliminary claim set for review, and a detailed description written figure by figure from the part lists, with support for chemical formulas and specifications in several languages.
Around the drafting sit invention disclosure capture, flowchart and drawing management, graphical claim drafting, inventor and client collaboration, Private PAIR integration and diagnostics that flag Section 112 problems and gaps in claim support before filing. A separate Office Action product handles responses. Pricing is published: 200 tokens for 199 dollars, more at a dollar each, with enterprise licensing on request.
PowerPatent, Inc. is based in Santa Clara, California, holds SOC 2 Type 2 certification and lists its own granted US patents on the site.
Capability grades
All 15 axes, graded from public sources on the date shown. Hover a grade to see what the letter means on that axis.
AI Centrality
How much of the product is actually AI. Whether the machine learning is the mechanism the buyer is paying for or a feature layered onto conventional software, and whether the vendor is specific about which is which.
The generative drafting is what a buyer pays for, on top of a drafting workspace that would still work without it. From a summary, a claim set and annotated drawings, the software writes the background, a preliminary set of claims and a detailed description tied figure by figure to the part lists, and the vendor's own framing is a first-draft co-pilot: 'we write the story' from the data gathered. Underneath sit invention disclosure capture, flowchart and drawing management, graphical claim drafting, collaboration with inventors and Private PAIR integration, which are workflow tools in their own right. Verified 20 September 2026.
Citation Accuracy and Hallucination Disclosure
Whether the vendor publishes measured accuracy on citations and assertions, grounds output to primary sources, and says plainly what its system does when it does not know. Legal has a documented public record of fabricated citations reaching filed briefs, so an untested claim of accuracy is not evidence.
Accuracy is claimed repeatedly and measured nowhere. The site promises unparalleled accuracy and quality, says the drafts adhere to patent office guidelines, and offers two figures in a demo pitch, five or more hours saved per application and Section 112 issues caught 30 per cent more often, neither attributed, dated or explained. The one real check described is internal: diagnostics that flag Section 112 problems, enablement, written description and indefiniteness, and gaps in claim support between the specification and the claims.
Against that, the terms state plainly that PowerPatent makes no representation that the service will be accurate or reliable and is not responsible for errors in processing. Verified 20 September 2026.
Autonomy and Oversight Model
What the system decides on its own, what a lawyer must approve, and whether the vendor documents where the review point sits. A tool that drafts under review and a tool that files without one are different products and different risks.
The product is built as a first draft for a qualified person to finish, and the agreement says who that person must be. The eligibility clause in the terms requires a user to represent that they can practise before a national patent office in their jurisdiction, which is a written limit on who may operate the drafting at all. The workflow puts the human at the end of every step: preliminary claims are generated for user review, the description is generated for editing, and the diagnostics report issues for a person to resolve before filing.
What is not published is any internal limit: no confidence threshold, no statement of what a generated draft may not be used for, and nothing on what happens when the model invents support that is not in the drawings. Verified 20 September 2026.
Operational and Outcome Evidence
Named, dated evidence that the product works in production at real firms or legal departments. Case studies with figures and identified customers count. Unattributed testimonials and launch announcements do not.
Logos and praise stand in for deployment evidence. The homepage carries a Trusted By strip and recognition images, and states that many law firms, corporations and inventors rely on the product, without naming one of them in text; the testimonials that appear are unattributed. The concrete items are awards rather than deployments: finalist for World IP Review's LSPN Awards USA 2025 in Technology Solution of the Year, and completion of SOC 2 Type 2 certification announced in a press release on the site. The two performance figures quoted in the demo pitch carry no customer, date or method. Verified 20 September 2026.
Privilege and Confidentiality Posture
How client confidences are handled: attorney client privilege and work product treatment, segregation of one client matter from another, whether client data trains any model, and what the vendor commits to in writing rather than in marketing.
For a product that handles unfiled applications, the published commitments are specific and they sit in the agreement rather than on a marketing page. The terms state that once results are provided the patent documents are immediately discarded, with no storing, caching or logging of their content; that processing runs on Google Cloud Platform or Amazon Web Services exclusively on computers in the United States; that portions of a document are transmitted to OpenAI only with the user's authorisation; that no data is shared with OpenAI for model training or improvement; and that PowerPatent will not disclose document content or results to any third party other than those processors.
The privacy policy of 11 July 2026 adds that some services involve privileged and confidential patent material and describes safeguards for it. What is absent is separation between customers and any treatment of privilege or work product in what the account retains, and the same policy tells users that they remain responsible for judging whether a workflow suits the sensitivity of what they submit. Verified 20 September 2026.
UPL and Professional Responsibility Posture
Whether the vendor is clear that it supplies a tool rather than legal advice, who its audience is, and how it addresses unauthorized practice of law, competence and supervision duties, and jurisdiction limits. ABA Formal Opinion 512 is the reference point. Where the advice line is not the duty a product raises, the axis is read through the nearest professional duty it does raise: judicial conduct rules and the reviewing duty for products sold only to courts, and the duty to bill for time actually spent for products that draft time entries.
The agreement states who may use the product, which few vendors do. Under the eligibility clause a user represents that they are at least 18 and can practise before a national patent office in their jurisdiction, and a separate clause states that nothing communicated through the service creates an attorney-client relationship, is a solicitation, or conveys legal advice or a substitute for it. The marketing points the other way: the contact form asks whether the visitor is a patent attorney or an inventor or founder, and the pitch to founders is first-to-file protection in days.
Nothing published addresses how the two fit together, what an unrepresented inventor should understand about filing a machine-drafted application, or how a supervising attorney should check one. Verified 20 September 2026.
AI Governance and Bias Disclosure
Published governance over model behaviour: who owns it inside the vendor, what is tested before release, and what is disclosed about disparate output across matter types, parties, or populations.
Nothing published addresses how the drafting models are built, tested or controlled. There is no responsible AI page or policy, nobody is named as accountable for model behaviour, nothing describes what is evaluated before a release ships, no results are published, and nothing addresses whether draft quality varies by technology area or by the language a specification is written in, which the vendor advertises as a strength.
The published AI material is about data handling rather than governance. Checked the homepage, the How It Works and pricing pages, the terms, the privacy policy and the press page on 20 September 2026. Verified 20 September 2026.
AI Safety and Data Stewardship
Retention, deletion, access control, and what happens to prompts and documents after they are processed. Whether the vendor states its subprocessors and its incident practice, or leaves the buyer to assume.
Most of what this axis asks for is published across two documents. The terms give the retention answer outright, immediate discard of patent documents with no caching or logging, and name the processors: Google Cloud Platform or Amazon Web Services, with all patent document processing on computers in the United States, and OpenAI for generation. The privacy policy of 11 July 2026 describes access controls, encryption, logging, monitoring, network protections and vendor management, sets out retention by service and setting, and covers international transfers.
Missing are an incident notification commitment to customers, a named subprocessor list beyond the three providers in the terms, and any reconciliation of the immediate-discard promise with the policy's statement that user content is retained as long as reasonably necessary. Verified 20 September 2026.
AI Liability and Recourse
What the vendor stands behind contractually when its output is wrong. Indemnities, caps, carve outs, insurance, and whether any of it is published or only reachable through a negotiated agreement.
The published position allocates the entire risk of a bad draft to the user. The terms include an assumption of risk clause stating that the user bears all risk, that PowerPatent holds no liability for outcomes, that it is not responsible for errors or inaccuracies in the processing of patent documents, and that the user is solely responsible for the content of their patent documents; warranties are disclaimed in full, liability is capped at the fees paid in the preceding twelve months, the user indemnifies PowerPatent, and disputes go to individual arbitration with a class waiver.
No indemnity runs to the customer, no warranty attaches to the generated text, and no insurance position appears, which matters where a defective specification can cost a priority date. Verified 20 September 2026.
Practice Systems Integration Depth
How deeply the product reaches into the systems legal work already lives in: document management such as iManage and NetDocuments, Word and Outlook, contract lifecycle management, matter management, e-billing, and court filing systems.
One integration is named and none is documented. Private PAIR integration appears in the published list of what the platform does, and the privacy policy refers in passing to Word add-ins, plugins and APIs among the services it covers, without a page, listing or document describing any of them. Nothing states what syncs with a docketing or IP management system, what a firm must configure, or how drafts move into the systems a prosecution practice runs on.
Checked the homepage, the How It Works and pricing pages, the terms, the privacy policy and the free tools page links on 20 September 2026, and searched the Microsoft marketplace for a PowerPatent Word add-in without finding one. Verified 20 September 2026.
Deployment Model and Data Residency
Where the software runs and where the data sits. Multi tenant cloud, single tenant, private deployment, on premises, and whether region of residence is a published option or an enterprise conversation.
Where processing happens is stated, and the customer gets a say in it. The terms provide that patent documents are processed on Google Cloud Platform or Amazon Web Services, that the choice between them rests with the user, and that all processing of patent documents on those platforms is done exclusively on computers in the United States, with each provider's own data processing terms named and linked. The privacy policy adds that some services may process data locally on the device while others run in PowerPatent-controlled or third-party cloud environments, and that international transfers may occur for other information. No tenancy model is described, and no region outside the United States is offered. Verified 20 September 2026.
Security Certifications and Trust Center
Independent attestation a buyer can pull without a sales call: SOC 2, ISO 27001, penetration test summaries, a trust center with current reports and named scope rather than a badge image.
The certification is real, stated and dated by a press release on the vendor's own site: PowerPatent, Inc. has completed SOC 2 Type 2 certification, with the AICPA SOC mark shown on the homepage. What the top band asks for beyond the name is missing: no auditor is identified, no scope statement or report period appears, there is no trust portal, and no route to obtain the report is published. A firm's security reviewer would be asking for the report and would have to ask the sales team. Verified 20 September 2026.
Model Supply Chain Disclosure
Which models sit underneath, whose they are, where they run, and whether the vendor commits to telling customers when that changes. A legal buyer inherits every dependency it cannot see.
The provider is named in the agreement, which is rare in this market. The terms state that PowerPatent offers generation using OpenAI's GPT technology, that using the feature authorises transmission of portions of the document to OpenAI via its API subject to OpenAI's data usage policies, and that no data is shared with OpenAI for training or improvement; Google Cloud Platform and Amazon Web Services are named as the processing platforms with their own terms linked, and the OpenAI and AWS marks appear on the homepage.
What is not published is the model or version, or any commitment to notify customers when the model behind the drafting changes. Verified 20 September 2026.
Commercial Transparency
Whether a buyer can learn what this costs without entering a sales process: published rates, the unit being charged, what sits behind an enterprise tier, and what implementation adds.
A buyer can see the entry price without talking to anyone. The pricing page publishes the unit and the rate: an initial purchase of 200 PowerPatent tokens for 199 dollars, additional tokens at one dollar each, a minimum balance of ten tokens to use the AI chat, and expiry six months from purchase, with the published guidance that most standard applications use fewer than 200 tokens and that complex workflows with searches or repeated checking need more.
What is withheld is the rest of the range: enterprise licensing is a contact-us, and the terms describe per-user subscriptions that renew automatically and are non-refundable, a structure the pricing page does not price. Verified 20 September 2026.
Firm and Practice Coverage
Who the product is actually built for. AmLaw, midlaw, small firm and solo, in house departments, government and courts, and which practice areas are supported rather than merely claimed.
The technical coverage is described in detail and the professional boundary is not. Twenty-three technology areas have their own pages, from semiconductors, software and communications to biopharmaceuticals, therapeutic antibodies, medical devices and agricultural biotech, and the drafting is said to handle chemical formulas and specifications in several languages. The buyers addressed are patent attorneys, agents and prosecution teams on one side and inventors and founders on the other, with a separate Office Action product for prosecution responses.
Nothing states which jurisdictions the drafting is suited to beyond the United States, which technology areas the models handle less well, or where the tool stops being appropriate. Verified 20 September 2026.
4 public documents
The public pages on file for PowerPatent, with the recorded signals each one supports and the date it was last read. Open any of them and check the reading against the record.
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powerpatent.com/terms5 signals
Client Data in Training, Prompt and Output Retention, Ethical Walls and Matter Segregation and 2 more
Read Sep 20, 2026
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powerpatent.com1 signal
Billing and Fee Posture
Read Sep 20, 2026
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powerpatent.com/privacy1 signal
Third Party Request and Subpoena Notice
Read Sep 20, 2026
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Fabricated Citation Record
Read Sep 20, 2026
$199USD, as published, never converted
- You buy credits, called tokens. The first 200 cost $199.
- The vendor says most patent applications use fewer than 200 tokens, so one application costs about $199.
- If you run out, more tokens cost $1 each, and your work stays saved.
- Tokens stop working six months after you buy them, and you need at least 10 in the account to use the AI chat.
- Bigger firms have to ask for enterprise pricing, which is not published.
Consumption pricing in tokens: an initial purchase of 200 tokens for 199 US dollars, additional tokens at 1 dollar each, a minimum balance of 10 tokens required to use the AI chat, and tokens expiring six months from purchase. The vendor states that most standard applications use fewer than 200 tokens and that complex workflows involving searches or repeated checking need more. Enterprise licensing is quoted on request and is not published, and the Terms of Use separately describe per-user subscriptions that renew automatically and are non-refundable, with no rate given.
Implementation: None published.
Note: Read from the pricing page and its published questions and answers, and from the subscription paragraph of the Terms of Use (revised 30 May 2023), on 20 September 2026.
Legal Signals
What each signal meansA signal records what public sources say on the date shown. It is not a grade and it is not a recommendation. Where a signal reads Not addressed, it means the index did not locate the material in public sources on that date, which is a statement about disclosure rather than about the product.
Client Data in Training
Can material a lawyer puts into this product be used to train a model?
The published terms prohibit training on customer content. Not a policy page, the agreement.
The commitment is in the agreement. The terms limit PowerPatent's licence over user content to the sole purpose of providing the services, and state that data is not shared with OpenAI for model training or improvement. The privacy policy of 11 July 2026 goes wider, saying that customer-submitted confidential content is not used to train, retrain or fine-tune third-party foundation models or PowerPatent's own general-purpose models unless expressly agreed in writing for a particular customer.
Prompt and Output Retention
How long does the product keep what a lawyer typed, and can that be set to zero?
A specific retention period is published and the customer cannot change it.
The terms set a fixed position the customer does not control: once results are provided, patent documents are immediately discarded, with no storing, caching or logging of their content. The privacy policy pulls the other way, saying user content is kept as long as reasonably necessary with periods varying by service, setting and agreement; the policy itself provides that a signed agreement controls where the two conflict.
Ethical Walls and Matter Segregation
Does retrieval respect the firm’s ethical walls, or can the model read across them?
No located public material addresses walls or matter level segregation.
The terms prohibit sharing an account or using it on behalf of another person, and restrict subscription content such as diagnostic results and examiner statistics to the user's own company, while allowing attorneys and agents to share output with their clients. That is licensing and confidentiality, not segregation: nothing describes separation between matters inside a firm or between customers.
Third Party Request and Subpoena Notice
If someone subpoenas the vendor for a firm’s data, does the firm hear about it first?
Published terms or policy address disclosure to authorities or in response to legal process, and no commitment or reservation regarding customer notice is located anywhere. The vendor has told the customer that data can leave and has said nothing about whether the customer hears of it.
The privacy policy of 11 July 2026 allows disclosure to governmental, regulatory, judicial or law enforcement authorities where required by law, subpoena, court order or legal process, with no commitment to notify the customer. The terms cut across it for one category, promising that the content of patent documents and processing results is not disclosed to any third party other than the named processors, but neither document says what happens when the demand is legal process.
Primary Law Corpus Provenance
Where does the law in this product come from, and does the vendor have the right to use it?
No located public material identifies the corpus behind the product’s answers.
Checked the homepage, the How It Works and pricing pages, the terms and the privacy policy on 20 September 2026. The drafting works from the user's own claims, summary and drawing annotations; the marketing says the models analyse vast amounts of patent data, and the terms note that some products rely on third-party data such as patent office data, without identifying any corpus, licence or update cadence.
Good Law Verification
Does the product tell you when the authority it just cited has been overruled?
No located public material addresses whether authority is checked for subsequent history.
For a patent product this asks whether the tool says a patent is still in force. Checked the homepage, the How It Works and pricing pages, the terms and the privacy policy on 20 September 2026. The product drafts applications and checks them for Section 112 problems rather than reporting legal status, and nothing addresses whether any patent surfaced through the examiner statistics or search features remains in force.
Refusal and Uncertainty Behaviour
What does the product do when the answer is not in the corpus?
No located public material addresses what the product does when it cannot ground an answer.
Checked the homepage, the How It Works page, the terms and the privacy policy on 20 September 2026. Nothing describes the drafting declining to generate, flagging that it lacks support in the drawings or claims, or attaching a confidence level to generated text. The published safeguards work the other way, by checking a finished draft for Section 112 problems and gaps in claim support.
Fabricated Citation Record
Does a public court record exist addressing fabricated or hallucinated legal citations in output from this product?
No court order, opinion or disciplinary record addressing fabricated or hallucinated legal citations produced by this product has been located as of the date shown. This is a statement about the public record on that one subject, not a finding about the product, and this signal is not a litigation history.
Searched the AI Hallucination Cases database maintained by Damien Charlotin on 20 September 2026 on the name PowerPatent. No court order, opinion or disciplinary record naming the product was located. This is a statement about the public record rather than a finding about the product, which drafts applications for a patent office rather than briefs for a court.
Bar Guidance Alignment
Has the vendor engaged in public with the ethics opinions its buyers are bound by?
Public materials refer to professional responsibility in general terms without naming guidance.
The terms engage a practitioner duty in general terms: a user must represent that they can practise before a national patent office in their jurisdiction, and a separate clause states that nothing communicated creates an attorney-client relationship, is a solicitation, or conveys legal advice. No ethics opinion, rule of professional conduct or patent office guidance on the use of AI in drafting is named anywhere on the estate.
Billing and Fee Posture
Does the vendor address what happens to the bill when the work takes an hour instead of six?
Public materials claim time savings without addressing billing or disclosure, and the product sits inside a fee relationship between a lawyer and a client where those savings would change the bill.
The published case is that the same work takes less time: first drafts in minutes, five or more hours saved per application, and a feature headed increase billable efficiency, work less and earn more. Where the buyer is a firm drafting for clients, those hours are billed hours, and nothing published addresses how a machine-drafted specification is described on the bill or whether the token cost is passed to the client.
Outside Counsel Guideline Readiness
Can a firm get this vendor through a client’s AI clause without a bespoke negotiation?
A current subprocessor or model provider list is published.
The three providers that touch a patent document are named in the agreement itself: Google Cloud Platform or Amazon Web Services for processing, with their data processing terms linked, and OpenAI for generation, with a statement that no data is shared for training. The privacy policy describes further categories of subprocessor, including AI infrastructure, without naming them, and no client-facing disclosure pack was located.
Court Disclosure Support
If a judge’s standing order requires an AI disclosure, can the product produce one?
No located public material addresses court disclosure or verification certification.
Checked the homepage, the How It Works page, the terms and the privacy policy on 20 September 2026. The product drafts and checks applications for filing at a patent office rather than producing court filings, and nothing records which parts of a specification were machine generated, which model produced them or who reviewed them, so no disclosure record could be exported if one were required.