Talk to an Inventor with 256 Patents — Who is Also an IP Lawyer, Litigator, and Expert Claims Draftsman
A 30-minute working session to understand what your invention is really worth, where it breaks under scrutiny, and how it could become broader, stronger, and more valuable.
This is not a sales call. Bring your invention, your product, your provisional, your patent, or your problem. Powered by the uber-inventive Gary Shuster, we’ll talk through your idea’s value, its weaknesses, the possibilities in use cases you’ve never thought of, and the next steps that make economic sense for you.
Gary Shuster — 256+ patents | Cameron Powell — 16 startups, investor-readiness and exit framing, trial lawyer, evidence-based storyteller | Working session, not legal advice
Most consultations review the invention. This one usually improves it.
Most first calls in this world have a familiar rhythm: a few questions, a few credentials, then the pitch.
This is different. Nowhere else can you have a call where all the know-how — invention, creativity, how IP works, how IP is attacked and protected in litigation, how IP is licensed and sold, how founders exit — is in one place, on the call.
Gary listens for where the invention is narrow, where the language is too cramped, where adjacent embodiments are hiding, and where a competitor might wriggle through. Cameron looks at what that means in the go-to-market world: product, narrative, valuation, answering hard investor questions, and exit strategy.
What Happens in 30 Minutes
The core protectable idea — What is actually valuable here, as opposed to merely interesting?
Risk and brittleness — Where is the idea narrow, vulnerable, easy to design around, or tangled up in someone else’s rights?
Expansion and additional use cases — What else could your invention cover — adjacent markets, future versions, pivots, or licensing lanes? All of these add to your valuation, your attractiveness to investors, and your readiness for the exit you dream about.
The right next move — File now, broaden first, validate more deeply, investigate infringement, build the invention pipeline, or wait.
The people on the call know how invention behaves under pressure
Gary Shuster has spent decades inventing, drafting, working hand in glove with patent lawyers, litigating, and coaching inventors. That makes him unusually good at hearing the sentence inside your explanation that matters — and the one that gives away too much.
Cameron Powell brings the other half: how the invention will land in the world. Product development and positioning. Go to market. Valuation. Investor scrutiny. Exit. He’s the evidence-based storyteller who has coached founders who have raised over $1B, launched successfully, found their choice of partners, and found the exit. Applying all this expertise to the invention process itself makes the inventions better and the IP protection stronger.
What You Walk Away With
A clearer read on whether the invention carries real protectable leverage. A sharper sense of the main risks. At least one better question, and often one better version of the invention. A recommendation about the next step.
Sometimes the recommendation is to move quickly. Sometimes it is to stop wasting money. Both are useful and save your valuable money and even more valuable cognitive energy.
This conversation is a good fit if…
You are building something and suspect the IP may be more valuable than the current version suggests.
You have a provisional, application, or patent and worry it may be too narrow.
You are preparing to fundraise, pivot, license, or defend your position.
You want an outside view from people who understand invention, litigation risk, how to commercialize, and what investors look for to invest and exit.
If all you need is a filing quote or routine administration, this is not the right page. Contact us here.
If there is value, we build on it
The next step could be a provisional path that preserves your rights right now. Most inventors wait too long to get their ideas on file.
The next step may be Validation: defensibility analysis, evidence mapping, expansion horizons, strategic positioning — transforming a promising invention into a structured, defensible artifact that investors and acquirers can evaluate.
Many clients are ready to ask for full broadening, family architecture, and licensing strategy through Moat & Toll Booth.
Sometimes they want to know if someone is using their idea, or if they’re infringing someone else’s. So we apply our proprietary Infringement Detective™.
Many teams are ready for Innovation Sprints because their idea is not yet rich enough: not yet a minimum viable product, not yet comprehensive enough to invite licensing by non-competitors, not yet broad enough to be protectable in a patent environment in which Big Tech and big money make the rules.
And sometimes the right answer is: not yet. Come back when the facts improve.
The first conversation should make the invention better.
If the first conversation does nothing but confirm what you already think, it was a wasted half hour. Let’s use the time well.
No hard sell. If formal legal work is needed, we’ll let you know where to look.