My question is regarding the patent in US.
The company I am working for is a big company located in US. There is a good idea about how our product should function, and the idea has been talked about for a while. Company has filed provisional patent application to protect the idea even though nobody knows what to do yet. This is not directly related to my work and I am not on the list of inventors.
Recently I have found the approach to solve the problem by myself. I am hesitated to disclose it to the company due to its potential commercial value. I believe I can use my own time to prototype it and prove it works. I am thinking the possibililty of applying my own patent when company's provisional patent expires, and sale it back to the company or other competitors.
Is this conduct legal or ethic? Can the company sue me for doing this because I have inside information?
Thanks in advance for any valuable input.