Does including a patent as a reference imply protection?

[hanzichi]

Hypothetically, say patent A references existing patent B, and patent A gets approved. Is patent A then protected from being accused for infringement by patent B owners?

From what I have gathered, the answer seems to be not necessarily, but I'm very new to all this. Thanks in advance!

[Brad]

No those would be two different things.   Remember, the patent office only cares if you are claiming a new idea.  They don't have the authority (or ability) to look at things like infringement.

Here is a crude example.   I could possibly get a patent on a new iphone case if my case is new but that does not mean I can start selling iphones with my case because Apple likely has 100+ patents on different areas of the iPhone. 

[hanzichi]

I understand your example and completely understand that there are infinity-1 patents out there and nobody is going to review them all. I also am getting the understanding that the patent office doesn't actually explicitly protect you from anything, but really just helps you put a stake in the ground saying I thought of this on this date - maybe somebody else already thought of it, maybe not.

But, to be clear, let's say in your example that your patent referenced a known patent 123. Is there any precedence that might imply that you are protected from being accused of copying/infringing that specific patent 123? Again, I understand that there might be other patents out there that are possibly an issue, but I'm talking about a specific patent that you referenced. Thanks!

[Brad]

Unfortuently you cannot get that from the patent office.  If your patent cites old_patent_123 and then your patent is allowed that just means that the patent examiner thought your idea was different enough from old_patent_123 that it could be its own invention.  It does not mean that you are clear and not infringing on old_patent_123.

Another simple example would be a bicycle.  If old_patent_123 claimed a bicycle with two wheels and you made a bicycle with three wheels you may get your own new patent approved because it was different than old_patent_123 with two wheels.  However, your three wheel bicycle also includes two wheels plus a third wheel so the owner of old_patent_123 may enforce their patent against you because your bicycle has two wheels.  the fact that you have three wheels does not matter because your three wheel bicycle also has two wheels (2+1=3).