The seat helps women "hover" (semi-stand/semi-squat) over the toilet, especially in public restrooms, and is really quite simple. Imagine small curved pads lifted above the rim of the toilet, supporting the back of your thighs. The user stands by the toilet as usual, then starts to sit as usual, except that the seat helps you to stay hovering several inches above the bowl, with only 2 small squares on the back of your legs touching the supports. That's the basis, with lots of add-ons and jazzy extras and options, including special paper protectors for those who find even 2 small areas of seat to be unsanitary, and handle-supports for people who need bracing when getting up and down.

This seat fits on existing toilets, either replacing or topping the existing toilet seat, depending on whether the bolts used to connect it to the toilet are long or short. When attached with long bolts over an existing toilet seat, the HoverSeat flips up out of the way, allowing access to the regular toilet seat for those who do want to sit on a flat seat.

Who needs it? Ask any woman how she feels about sitting on a toilet in a public restroom, and you'll understand the need. No woman ever sits on a public toilet. Even with paper protectors, the seats get wet, and the protectors can fall into the toilet. I, for one, don't trust the plastic sleeves - they raise mental images of the sleeve going around and around, being used over and over, rather than being wound into a spool with new clean plastic coming out.

This seat prevents both dribble-down and splash-back. Hence, the HoverSeat™ is also the Stay-Dry Toilet Seat™! Invented by a woman, Mindy Machanic, designer and psychologist, for women (and men) who ever use public toilets. And useful in anywhere people share facilities.

I am looking for  a company to license this product, or experts in R&D (prototyping and working manufacturing drawings) and manufacturing, people/companies with both expertise and money to invest, who are willing to take a risk on getting this out into the world in exchange for a piece of the potential profits rather than for cash up-front.

Think of how many toilets there are in public places like planes, trains, buses, convention centers, hospitals, nursing homes, parks, roadside rests, restaurants, office buildings, coliseums, theaters, airports, bus stations, train depots, pubs, stadiums, etc., and you begin to get an idea of the potential market of this concept. I'd like to retire in comfort because of the Hoverseat™/Stay-Dry Toilet Seat™, and I don't mind splitting the pie. Based on the emailed responses so far, it should sell very well world-wide, with only minimal modifications for regional differences, such as for the hole-in-the-floor squat toilets in many areas - a huge market that could really use this seat. 

According to a paper on modeling the value of patents, published in a journal of law and economics around 2002 (citation to follow), this toilet seat patent showed higher financial value than all but a one or two of the other patents used to illustrate the valuation methodology. Something over $4 million was the figure used for initial value! So somebody else agrees with me ...