By Severin de Wit A recently published paper by Dr. Gaetan de Rassenfosse explains how firms can use their patents to finance innovation [1]. He argues that patents aimed at monetization of IP is more important for SMEs than for large companies and reports evidence that European SMEs face more difficulties than SMEs in the […]
IP and IC — the same thing or not?
August 2, 2012 by 2 Comments
By Mary Adams Intellectual property (IP) is a term that is usually used to refer to specific types of structural capital that enjoy special legal status. These include patents, trademarks, copyrights, and trade secrets. Each of these categories has a specific body of law associated with it. Patents have to be approved by a national […]
The core of an IP Strategists work…
July 29, 2012 by Leave a Comment
By Duncan Bucknell “And the core of the strategist’s work is always the same, discover the crucial factors in a situation and design a way to coordinate and focus actions to deal with them.” (Richard Rumelt in the June 2011 McKinsey Quarterly.) I think this is a great summary – it gets to the heart […]
Patent Thickets, right or wrong?
July 28, 2012 by Leave a Comment
By Severin de Wit Patents are instituted to provide an incentive to innovate, which is important considering that innovation is a key driver for economic prosperity. Yet, what happens if the company that holds the patent right does not want to produce anything, but instead holds-up other patent right holders? Certain combinations of patent rights, […]
Avoid jointly owned intellectual property like the plague
July 26, 2012 by 1 Comment
By Donal O’Connell Not all the smart people work for you Traditionally, internal innovation was the paradigm in which most companies operated. Most innovating companies kept their discoveries highly secret and made no attempt to assimilate information from outside their own research and development laboratories. This was driven by the belief that “the smart people […]
Eight Species of Patent Strategy – Part 1 the framework
July 23, 2012 by Leave a Comment
By Bill Meade Introduction: When invited to give a talk for an American Corporate Council Association (which changed its name to the Association of Corporate Council) in 2004 I was asked to speak on “patent strategy.” When I complained “That is a pretty big topic, can you narrow it down a little for me?” the […]
Facebook’s Patent Acquisitions? They’re More About Google Than Yahoo
July 19, 2012 by Leave a Comment
By Leonid Kravets Facebook’s patent portfolio has grown exponentially as a result of acquisitions of patent portfolios from IBM and Microsoft. After acquiring 650 AOL patents and patent applications from Microsoft, the company now has approximately 1,400 patent assets. Amazingly, only 46 of these assets (24 issued patents and22 published applications) were originally filed by Facebook. In recent years, Facebook […]
PCT growth in Thailand
July 17, 2012 by Leave a Comment
By Nick Redfearn Thailand’s accession to the PCT is providing the promised ease and savings for patent applicants. Data from the Thai IPD shows a good take up from major users like US, China, Japan and Korea. PCT National Application (Inbound) – started from 1 July 2010 Year Numbers 2010 28 2011 2,149 2012 (until 24 […]
Circular Logic in Patent Analysis
July 16, 2012 by 8 Comments
By Robert Cantrell If you encountered an alien from another world and wanted him to understand the concept of what a word is, chances are you would put words (and their object or idea representation) into context with the letters from which we write them and the sentences and paragraphs for which they are a […]
Dominant Design and Lost Profits in Creative Labs v Apple Computer
July 8, 2012 by Leave a Comment
By Bill Meade James M. Utterback’s (1994) MASTERING THE DYNAMICS OF INNOVATION is one of my favorite books. Utterback has lately been squeezed between Clayton Christensen’s work on disruptive innovation and Geoffrey Moore’s work on market structure and shareholder wealth management. But, I think Utterback deserves reading by patent attorneys. First, because, Utterback’s book is […]
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