The European Patent Office’s recent annual report reveals that UK applicants filed only 339 European patent applications last year compared to 1,323 applications from German applicants and 492 from the French.
“Many of the UK’s small and medium-sized businesses [SMBs] do not realise the value of developing an effective intellectual property strategy. Others appreciate the value, but hit difficulties when they try to implement one,” says Ed Round, a chartered and European patent attorney at intellectual property firm Marks & Clerk.
By taking a strategic view of how IP affects a business, alongside helping clients secure patent protection, Mr Round has seen the fruits of good and bad IP planning at all stages of business growth.
Businesses have different reasons for investing in IP. “Some SMBs protect their IP simply because they are looking for investment. Many investors refuse to invest in a company unless it has protected its crown jewels with IP rights like patents. Others look beyond the priorities of investors to how the protection afforded by IP will help them protect and increase their revenue streams,” he says.
“Having a monopoly might mean they can sell their product for more. Or it might simply prove impossible to compete with cheap knock-off products, so securing a patent is the only way to ensure profit can be made at all.”
Most SMBs will have a business strategy in place as they begin their product development process. They will have commercial objectives and a plan to achieve them.
“The key is allowing time at the beginning to develop an IP strategy that helps you achieve these objectives – what you want to protect with registered IP rights like patents and trademarks, what territories you want to seek protection in, what further protection you want to secure as your research and development continues,” says Mr Round.
“You can’t start by creating an IP strategy in isolation and then bolt it on to your business plan afterwards.”
Business owners also need to consider how to avoid being sued by a competitor. Just because they have their own IP rights in place, it doesn’t mean they are not infringing other parties’ rights.
If you can ensure your IP strategy and its execution evolve alongside your business planning, your patents, trademarks and other rights should add value to your business
“Time is almost always a challenge for business owners and management teams, but sufficient time needs to be invested by board-level decision-makers in developing an IP strategy that helps you fulfil your business objectives,” he says.
“We sometimes have businesses coming to us days before a product launch saying ‘we’re going to market and we need a patent, and we need to know if we’re going to infringe any competitor rights’.
“By that point, it may be too late for a patent application if the product has already been made public. Even if the invention has not entered the public domain, it is difficult to draft a decent patent application in such a short time period and it will prove massively stressful, not just for the management, but for the product development and sales teams too.”
Once a business has established its IP strategy, executing and maintaining it can also prove to be a challenge. “Establishing good internal processes will prove vital. Implementing an IP capture process ensures you know what your research and development teams are doing. Using your strategic business objectives as criteria, you can then make an informed choice about what to protect with IP rights,” Mr Round explains.
“IP capture processes can also incentivise valuable innovation within your teams and help you keep your teams aligned with your business’s strategic objectives.
“Ultimately, if you can ensure your IP strategy and its execution evolve alongside your business planning, your patents, trademarks and other rights should add value to your business.”
As UK business looks beyond Europe for exporting opportunities, IP will only become more fundamental to high-performing SMBs’ business planning.
For more information please visit www.marks-clerk.com
