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How do you protect your IP Processes? More importantly, have you ever done a freedom to operate clearance on them? To kick off this short series of posts, here are a few insights on some of the top ‘patent process’ patent filers, what they are covering, and the most cited patents. Given my 100 per cent client focus, I couldn’t really do this topic justice but I look forward to further insights… Read More
Guest post by Robert Cantrell An IP strategy should take account of the natural course of technology evolution so that it provides adequate protections into the future. For example, product solutions tend, over time, to move towards an ideal state of providing more and more benefit with less and less drawback. So where your IP protects innovation that does provide more benefits or fewer drawbacks, it is likely aligned with the course… Read More
What is better for a product-based IP Strategy, an open system of innovation or a closed system? The answer is both and neither, and here is why. Strategy, at its core, is the interplay between interaction and isolation. Everything that you do in IP strategy, from the most complex to the most mundane, is to create favorable interactions and isolations between you, customers, partners, and competitors. For example, the right to enforce… Read More
Most organizations create a system whereby IP tasks are created, assigned, monitored and enforced. IP responsibility is vague and it needs to be deduced into number of tasks of definite nature. Sometimes IP tasks do not adequately cover an underlying IP responsibility whereas in other cases IP responsibilities go unrecognized. So one check point is to confirm if responsibility to task conversion is done appropriately. Unless this conversion is perfect, no responsibility… Read More
In my IP strategy courses, I describe ten angles of competition, the sixth of which I define as a potential customer providing a solution to a need himself. For example, a house painter competes with more than other house painters when he proposes to paint a house. He also competes with the capacity and willingness of a home owner to just pick up his own brush and paint that house. External IP… Read More
As part of our efforts to understand local challenges and build local IP communities, a little over two weeks ago Think IP Strategy organized a workshop and networking event in Copenhagen. We would like to thank everyone for attending and actively participating in what was an interesting exchange of ideas. Here are some highlights from the discussion of that day… The event was structured around four seminars each dealing with different aspects… Read More
You do your best work when you can sit down quietly and focus on the task at hand. It’s the same with IP strategy of course. You need to focus your attention, highly tune it to the situation before you. Identify what you’re trying to achieve, work out what you need to do to get there, then focus and prioritise these things according to the magnitude of their effect on achieving the… Read More
A Holiday party treasure hunt this month became a reminder about how winning a game also depends upon understanding exactly what game you are playing. This treasure hunt game involved finding 12 clues and answering 12 questions about objects around where the clues were found. As the dozen or so teams heard the rules of play, they learned that the first three teams to find all the clues and answer all the… Read More
All the IP in the world is potentially available to help you advance your business. This includes IP owned by customers, partners, and competitors. How you make this so depends upon your associated strategy. For example, if your competitor has IP that you would like to have and has been reluctant to share, then you might point out that your alternative to their cooperation is to make a competitive solution of your… Read More
Whether a CIPO, IP Business Manager, Chief IP Officer or other title, what are the key attributes that individual needs to be successful when tasked with developing and implementing a coordinated company IP strategy. Here’s my personal top 5 in order: 1) Senior company individual with authority to implement change This is top of my list. CEOs and their direct staff are usually well-aware of the importance of IP and how its… Read More
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