Question Giants.

Each company I worked for, required me to sign an agreement that if I invented something while employed by them, related to the company itself be it on company time or not, the company owned the patent, not the employee.

If I worked at HP and invented a new mouse trap working in my garage on weekends, they could care less, but if I did same for a thingy that can be used in an HP product, they owned it.

Please clarify what a HP engineer, who invented something HP could use, who owns the patent.