High Wire Networks Inc (HWNI)

[InforichIH]

From the current Mantra Venture website section on Intellectual Property:

Mantra Energy owns the intellectual property applied for in WO 2007/041872, titled “Continuous Co-Current Electrochemical Reduction of Carbon Dioxide.” This IP was obtained from Professor Oloman’s company in 2008, after seven years of development at the Clean Energy Research Centre of the University of British Columbia. Patents have since been obtained in India and China and patent examinations are underway in Canada, the United States, Europe, and Australia.

So the current USPTO status for Mantra is patent pending.

Since a USPTO term is 20 years from earliest application date or 17 years from grant date, the Texaco 1985 process would now be in public domain. Curiously, it does not seem to be listed among the many References on the Abstract of application 8,562,911: "Process for making formic acid" assigned to Liquid Light, Inc. BTW, I'm not a lawyer, but a research generalist.

In sum: investigators worldwide have long been engaged in research using many approaches to this vital and lucrative process.