USTRANSCOM obtains its first trademark

Trademarks everywhere — on that instantly-recognizable can of soda, the front of cars and social network home pages. Now U.S. Transportation Command has a trademark of its own, which may seem novel for a combatant command with a Department of Defense global distribution mission. The trademark is for the Warfighter Sleep Kit™. 

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office defines a trademark as “a word, phrase, symbol or design, or a combination of words, phrases, symbols or designs, that identifies and distinguishes the source of the goods of one party from those of others.”  Warfighter Sleep Kit™ is that distinguishing phrase owned by USTRANSCOM.

How this aid to personnel working in stressful, unpredictable and prolonged work environments came about, and USTRANSCOM’s role in its creation, is also the story of a new command process.

USTRANSCOM component Air Mobility Command developed the kit, and the Naval Medical Research Center, Silver Spring, Md., sponsored it as part of the Defense Safety Oversight Council’s Comprehensive Alertness Management in Military Operations initiative.

Air National Guard Maj. Lynn Lee invented the kit in cooperation with Dr. Anne Germain of the University of Pittsburgh, the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, Concurrent Technologies Corporation and Advantive Federal, a service-disabled, veteran-owned small business.

For the warfighter, adequate sleep is essential to survival. The easy-to-use kit includes tools and information to help increase alertness and job effectiveness.

The kit contains a camouflaged sleep mask, ear plugs, a guide to healthy sleep practices and a DVD featuring:

- Sleep assessment program
- Shift work schedule sleep guide
- Warrior Mind Training stress/relaxation videos
- Interactive version of DOD’s Alertness Management in Military Operations software

USTRANSCOM is now seeking a company to mass-produce the kits and sell them inexpensively to government users through the General Services Administration.

USTRANSCOM became the kit champion through its Office of Research and Technology Applications. The ORTA manages cooperative research and development activities with industry and academia and manages patenting and licensing.

TechLink, a DOD-funded organization at Montana State that helps bring new DOD technologies and users together, contacted the ORTA. At the time, the kit lacked a champion to push its trademark and the kit production through TechLink processes.

“The Warfighter Sleep Kit™ is a great example of a diverse DOD community, led by USTRANSCOM, pulling together to create innovation that provides the warfighter the tools they need to be stronger and healthier,” said Sean Pattan, senior technology manager, TechLink . “The Warfighter Sleep Kit™ allows this community to be recognized for this substantial contribution to the mission.”

“USTRANSCOM usually builds partnerships to explore technology through cooperative work with industry and academia,” said Mark Surina, ORTA technical manager, a member of MITRE Corporation. “The Warfighter Sleep Kit™ is our first instance of the reverse: using federal laboratory technology transfer procedures to get a DOD-developed product out to users. The ORTA is seeking other opportunities for DOD-developed technologies to ‘spin out’ to those who can produce them to benefit the public and private sectors with new products, jobs and industries." 

– USTRANSCOM –