They are four men who bond in a unique way - by coming up with innovative solutions to some of the world's most nettlesome problems.

Reprinted with permission from
Boston Business Journal, Mar.28-Apr.3, 1997, Page 15

On one recent morning, Richard Pavelle, A. Ze'ev Hed, Sol Aisenberg and George Freedman were sitting around a conference table in a sterile-looking Woburn office building. Ideas flew around the table like the morning traffic whipping past on nearby Route 128.

The four men are partners in Invent Resources Inc. of Lexington, billed as a one-stop shop where companies and individuals can go and order up an invention for a fee.

At least once a week, the four men, aged 54 to 75, sit down together and brainstorm ideas.

Begun four years ago, Invent Resources expects to have revenue of $100,000 to $400,000 this year, depending on how many of its ideas move forward. Combined, the four partners have guided the development of more than 200 products and have received more than 80 patents on their inventions.

Drawing on different yet distinguished backgrounds, the foursome works together well, meshing like the gears in a Leonardo Da Vinci drawing. As a group, they cover a wide territory, holding advanced degrees in such rarefied areas as nuclear physics, solid state physics and physical electronics.

"We like to say that our specialty is our generality said Dr. Pavelle.

The four men met through Qube, a consultants' association in Burlington, and decided that four inventors' minds would invent better than one. All of the partners continue to work on their own projects as individual inventors.

Invent Resources recently developed two new inventions the partners say could have great market potential. The first technology produces personal care and household goods that repel bacteria when they come into contact with water. Toys, toothbrushes and bandages could be manufactured with this technology. The second invention allows for a new class of car batteries that can be fully charged in two minutes.

The partners won't say which companies they are developing these technologies for, but they are excited about the commercial opportunities.

Invent Resources is in the process of helping Hunt Manufacturing Inc. of Philadelphia to build a better pencil sharpener. So far, Hunt, maker of X-acto knives and Boston-brand pencil sharpeners, has paid Invent Resources $36,000 to research and develop the pencil sharpener.

"This would revolutionize the way you sharpen a pencil," said Burt Kehoe, vice president of product development at Hunt.

Kehoe said he retained the services of Invent Resources to perform research and development that Hunt manufacturing couldn't undertake on its own.

"You look at their credentials and think, 'Wow, there's a lot of brainpower here,' " Kehoe said of the partners.

In 1976, Pavelle invented a thin, flexible calculator. In the early 1980s, he licensed it to Casio Computer Co. Ltd., Sharp Computer Corp. and Canon Corp. To date, Pavelle said he has received about $1 million in royalties from the invention, known as the "credit card calculator."

Invent Resources solicits customers through newspaper advertisements, word of mouth and its World Wide Web page - www.weinvent.com .

Most inventors work in isolation, dealing with a problem head-on in the loneliness of the laboratory. Not these four.

"There is a great deal of cross-fertilization of ideas that goes on," said Aisenberg a partner who pioneered the invention of artificial diamond materials.

Customers who contact Invent Resources must first show proof that they have the resources to market and manufacture any product that might be invented. If Invent Resources determines that it's a worthwhile and solvable problem, both parties strike a confidentiality agreement and Invent Resources goes to work - at no cost.

If Invent Resources can't come up with a solution, the customer walks away, owing nothing. But if the company has found an answer, the customer can pay a $2,000 fee and secure a two-month option to negotiate a license on the invention. The customer is also responsible for further product development costs.

"Many inventors make the mistake of having a solution and looking for the problem," said Hed. "We have people coming to us with problems looking for solutions."

Hed, a physicist who has spent much of his invention career developing high-temperature superconductor material, has focused in recent years on lighting systems that help night-shift workers deal with the change in their Circadian rhythms.

Freedman, another partner, spent 18 years at Raytheon Co. working at the company's New Products Center in Burlington, where he helped invent grills and popcorn makers for microwave ovens.

At Invent Resources, the atmosphere of teamwork pays off, Freedman said. "The minute a knowledge gap shows up with one of us, the other three can immediately fill it in," he said.

Some problems, however, the partners in Invent Resources can't get excited about solving. "We were asked to find a method of protecting telephone poles from woodpeckers," Pavelle said. "We took a pass on that one."