Background The patent statute recognizes that an invention may be jointly invented, however, there is no definition of inventorship in the patent statute. For this reason, the courts have been left to determine what constitutes sufficient contribution to an invention to qualify one for inventorship. 35 U.S.C. § 116 (2018) states: Inventors may apply for a patent jointly even though (1) they did not physically work together or at the same time, (2) each did not make the same type of amount or contribution, or (3) each did not make a contribution to the subject matter of every claim of the patent. Thus, the statute sets out elements not required for joint inventorship but fails to “set forth the minimum quality or quantity of contribution required for joint inventorship.”