XG Sciences Announces New Battery Anode with Four Times the Capacity of Conventional Materials

Lansing-based XG Sciences, Inc. has launched a new generation of anode materials for lithium-ion batteries with four times the capacity of conventional anodes. The new anode material is produced through proprietary manufacturing processes and uses XG’s xGnP® grapheme nanoplatelets to stabilize silicon particles in a nano-engineered composite structure. The material displays dramatically improved charge storage capacity with good cycle life and high efficiencies.

This is great news for applications like smartphones, tablet computers, and other products that use rechargeable lithium-ion batteries. XG is working with battery makers to translate this exciting new technology into batteries with longer run-time, faster charging capabilities, and smaller sizes.

Click here for more information about this exciting development.

Categories: Intellectual Property, Trade Secrets

White House Decrees Free Access to Government Research

The White House has declared that the results of government funded research, with certain exceptions for classified data, will be available to the public for free within in a year. Such results include peer-reviewed publications and digital data. Read More ›

Categories: News & Events, Regulatory

Michigan’s New Law Protects Online Privacy

Michigan’s new law, the Internet Privacy Protection Act (IPPA), protects employees, potential employees, students and applicants from giving employers and educators access to their personal social media accounts. Under the new law, accounts such as Gmail, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr or Twitter are covered. Employers and school administrators can’t discharge, fail to hire or admit or otherwise penalize their current or potential employees or students for refusing their request. Read More ›

Categories: Employment, Privacy

Your Garage Sale could be at risk

It might be illegal to sell those treasures.

The excitement of the hunt for the perfect item at the flea market or the thrill of selling your relative’s antique lamp at a great price could soon be dimmed by the Supreme Court of the United States.  Read More ›

Categories: Copyright, Intellectual Property

Does Apple’s Siri Record and Store Everything You Say?

Many people love having an application on their iPhone that can convert nearly anything they say into text.  But what does Apple do with what you say to Siri?

Most people are unaware that everything you say to Siri is sent to a data center in North Carolina.  It is sent to Apple in order to convert what you say into text. Read More ›

Categories: Privacy

“Doppelganger Domain” Names Could be Stealing Your E-mails

Are your e-mails going astray? Do customers claim they have sent an e-mail that you didn’t receive or can’t find

It could be that they were never sent or it could be that a “doppelganger domain” name has been set up to steal e-mails that are supposed to be going to you or other employees of your business. Read More ›

Categories: Domain Name Registration

Top-Level Domain Names: Protect Your Rights

In 2011, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) removed most restrictions on the names of generic top-level domains.  A top-level domain name is the letters after the “dot” in a website address.  The most common top-level domains are “.com” and “.org”.  Internet domains can now be any phrase and contain non-Latin characters (for example, Chinese, Arabic, etc.). Read More ›

Categories: Domain Name Registration, Intellectual Property

Michigan Sales Tax on Internet Retailers...Possibly

The applicability of sales tax in Internet transactions is a contentious issue in the state tax arena.  Many Internet retailers do not collect sales tax on their sales unless they have a physical presence in a state.  As a result, states have alleged that they are losing millions in tax dollars and brick-and-mortar retailers are operating at competitive disadvantages to their online competitors that do not impose sales tax.  Although states have encountered Constitutional difficulties in taxing out-of-state retailers, the pendulum may be swinging in favor of the states. Read More ›

Categories: E-Commerce, Tax

Listen Up - Foster Swift Attorneys Discuss Interplay Between Intellectual Property and Your Business

Intellectual property is a valuable asset for any business.  Recently, on the Michigan Business Network Legal Impact Hour, Foster Swift intellectual property attorneys, Sam Frederick and Zach Behler, discussed the interplay between intellectual property and business success. Listen to podcasts of the discussion:

• Introduction to Intellectual Property
• Trademarks
• Trademarks & Patents
• Copyrights & Trade Secrets
• Trade Secrets
• Intellectual Property Overview

If you have a question regarding intellectual property, please contact one of Foster Swift's IP attorneys. 

Categories: Copyright, Intellectual Property, Patents, Trade Secrets, Trademarks

U.S. Supreme Court Strikes Down Warrantless GPS Tracking

Let's revisit a previous posting regarding the scope of the Fourth Amendment in the digital era. 

Last year, the Department of Justice requested the U.S. Supreme Court to approve the warrantless and covert attachment by law enforcement of a GPS tracking device to an individual's vehicle. The DOJ’s request arose from a U.S. Court of Appeals decision, which vacated the life sentence of a convicted drug dealer.  In that case, the Court of Appeals held that law enforcement violated the individual’s Fourth Amendment rights by secretly attaching a GPS tracking device to the individual’s vehicle without a warrant. Read More ›

Categories: Privacy