Large companies can afford to file patents on every idea they have. Small companies, we have to weigh our options, do the research. We have to decide where to place our bets. We can't just cover everything we do. — Lonnie Johnson Copy Share Image
I got my first patent in 1979 before I left the Air Force. I called it the Digital Distance Measuring Instrument. It used ones and zeros and dots and dashes and a magnifying lens to read binary-encoded information from a… — Lonnie Johnson Copy Share Image
More and more, other countries are able to manufacture things cheaper, beating us in the marketplace in a lot of ways. So we need… — Lonnie Johnson Copy Share Image
Lady Luck is indifferent. She smiles sometimes, and she frowns sometimes. — Lonnie Johnson Copy Share Image
The invention that most people know me for is the Super Soaker water gun. I knew the gun worked well, and I knew it… — Lonnie Johnson Copy Share Image
It was because of the success of the Super Soaker, I was able to at least get an audience with people to present some… — Lonnie Johnson Copy Share Image
Large companies can afford to file patents on every idea they have. Small companies, we have to weigh our options, do the research. We… — Lonnie Johnson Copy Share Image
I have a collection of SuperSoakers. I have managed to keep most of them. — Lonnie Johnson Copy Share Image
I can remember times when we'd be having parties, and people would be dancing and everything and I would be sitting there in the… — Lonnie Johnson Copy Share Image
Being an independent inventor is tough. You develop a product, patent it, then you're looking for someone who will see the benefit from this… — Lonnie Johnson Copy Share Image
I didn't want to grow old and find that I didn't do what I could have done, that I didn't put my best foot… — Lonnie Johnson Copy Share Image
I consider myself a general practitioner. I do electronic things. I do toys and water things, mechanical stuff. I'm very, very flexible. — Lonnie Johnson Copy Share Image
Peer review is fine, as long as you're making incremental improvements to a technology. — Lonnie Johnson Copy Share Image
I decided I could develop a toy and get some revenue from that and then use that revenue to really become an inventor and… — Lonnie Johnson Copy Share Image
