There's a story Dr Stephen Bewlay tells of an Australian landscape supplier who came up with a bright idea to mould concrete railway sleepers to look like timber.
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Customers flooded to his store to buy them for their gardens and retaining walls. So too did his opposition keen to replicate the idea for their own financial gain.
Because he hadn't patented the invention the other landscape manufacturers were legally free to copy it and make money off the end product.
"Sleepers only used to be available when the railway sold off a bunch of them," says Bewlay. "So this guy had an idea to make his own out of concrete giving them a fake wood grain texture. They were very popular. The whole industry benefitted. It gave landscapers more choice.
"But if the guy had patented the idea, he could have protected his position in the market and have stopped the other landscape suppliers competing with him in regards to sleepers. So instead of using his own idea to get a jump start on his competitors, they ended up getting a jump start on him."
Bewlay, who worked as a patent examiner for IP Australia (Intellectual Property) in Canberra for more than four years, now lives in Wollongong.
There are four patents with Bewlay's name on them, but his most recent invention is the novel idea of a rectangular watermelon that he calls rectangumelons.
He's not the first in the world to come up with a different shaped fruit - the Japanese beat him to the punch growing cubic and heart-shaped watermelons.
But Bewlay, who has set up his own business Eco-Sight, believes a rectangular watermelon could be more commercially viable.
"I'd seen media coverage of the Japanese cube melons but I thought that they were not really very practical. They are too high and wouldn't fit in a fridge. That's when I thought that a rectangular prism watermelon would be a more practical shape."
Bewlay first examined the Japanese and Taiwanese patents to make certain that there were no infringements. He then set about designing his own moulds which he believes are superior to the Japanese.
Because the Japanese patents were "too specific" he was free to test a variety of materials for his moulds.
"I thought I could do a better job basically," Bewlay says.
"So I did my own patent that covers rectangular prisms and some other shapes as well.
"The trick is when you do a patent, you don't want it to be too narrow. You want it to cover all the possibilities so that in the future you can be flexible to adapt your idea and still be covered."
The Japanese inventor, who had used a steel mould, had patent protection specifically for a "cubic shaped" watermelon.
"If it says cube, well then, it's a cube," says Bewlay, who designed his mould using various cost-effective plastics, wood and steel tubes.
Bewlay has had a test run of his invention. Growing a large field of watermelon vines somewhere south of Wollongong, the location of which is top secret.
"I know it works because I've tried it," he says. "I was also playing around a bit with rockmelons, but at the moment the watermelons are ready to go."
The aim he says is to sell the idea of the moulds to large watermelon producers.
"It's not so much that I'll sell the mould to them, but I'll help them use the concept on a large scale in exchange for royalty fees," says Bewlay. "I would help get them started and then let them run with it."
Bewlay's other patents are more heavy duty involving the harvesting of waste heat from car engines and turning it into electricity to recharge a car's own battery.
"By harnessing the heat from the exhaust you could power electrical items," explains Bewlay.
"I'm the inventor of the idea but I'm no longer the owner. I sold my idea to a company that is working on developing it. If it makes money I'll also get royalties."
Anyone from any background can have a good idea, says Bewlay.
"Inventing is worthwhile, everything that's appreciated in technology today began as a new invention," he says. "Someone invented the iPhone for example."
Australians have a good reputation for being clever and innovative. There are a lot of good international success stories from Wi-Fi to software packages.
He says anyone can lodge their own patent application and there's a raft of information on the IP Australia website.
"The best thing to do is to examine a lot of other successful patents. Not just the applications, but the ones that have already been granted patent rights," Bewlay says.
"Look at the full descriptions, claims and supporting diagrams. It has to be a complete recipe. You can't leave out any key issues.
"Lodging a patent is not difficult to do if you know the rules and it's not that expensive."