concept-interviewing

Concept Interview

Purpose

Define the product concept and identify competitors. This establishes the foundation for patent targeting.

Prerequisites

No specific prerequisites required.

Skill Orchestration

Do NOT delegate to subagents (Agent tool) — invoke Skills directly from this session.

Process

Step 1: Check Existing Specification

Use the Glob tool to check if specification.md exists:

• If exists:
  • Read the existing specification
  • Check if "Verified Assignee Names" table contains proper assignee name variations:
    • If assignee names are listed with variations: Verification already complete — skip to confirmation
    • If assignee names are missing or incomplete: Perform assignee verification (Step 3)
• If NOT exists: Proceed to Step 2

Step 2: Information Gathering

Extract the following information from the user's input:

Required Information:

• Product Concept: Detailed description of what they want to realize
• Competitors: List of key competitor companies (Mandatory)
• Target Country: Where the product will be released (e.g., US, JP)
• Target Release Date: Approximate date
• Cutoff Date: Calculate Target Release Date - 20 years. Patents filed before this date are likely expired

Extraction Logic:

• If the user provides a country (e.g., "in the US", "US market"), extract and use that
• If the user provides a release date (e.g., "2025", "June 2025"), extract and use that
• Extract competitors from mentions of company names

If any required information is missing:

• Ask the user to provide the missing information
• Do not make assumptions or use default values

[!NOTE] In automated test environments, ensure all required information is provided in the initial request to avoid interactive prompts.

Step 3: Assignee Identification

For each competitor, verify the correct "Assignee Name" used in patent databases.

1. Verify: Invoke Skills in parallel for efficiency:

   Skill: skill="google-patent-cli:patent-assignee-check" args="<Company Name> --country <Target Country>"
   

   • Omit the limit parameter to get all assignee variations (default: 100)
   • CRITICAL: Check skill response:
     • Verify the response does NOT contain errors
     • If skill fails: Refer to references/troubleshooting.md for error handling
     • Do NOT proceed with fabricated or assumed assignee names

2. Confirm: Display the top assignee variations found and ask the user if they represent the intended competitor.

3. Refine: If incorrect or no hits, try variations (e.g., "Google LLC" instead of "Google").

4. Finalize:

   • Fill the Verified Assignee Names (Canonicalized) table in specification.md
   • Record all identified official Assignee Names, including all name variations
   • Record the verification status and any notes (e.g., holding company, subsidiary)

Step 4: Transition to Targeting

• Deliverable: specification.md created with verified assignee names
• Next skill: /patent-kit:targeting

Output Management

• Output File: specification.md
• Template: Use assets/templates/specification-template.md
• Format: Markdown (not JSON)
• Note: This file is referenced by all subsequent skills (targeting, screening, evaluating, claim-analyzing)

State Management

Initial State

• No specification.md (proceed with interview)
• OR specification.md exists (skip to verification/confirmation)

Final State

• specification.md created with:
  • Product concept clearly defined
  • Target country and release date specified
  • All competitors' assignee names verified
  • Complete information saved

Quality Gates

• Product concept is clearly defined.
• Target country and release date are specified.
• All competitors' assignee names are verified in the database.
• Specification file is saved with complete information.