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Hello PIUG!
For a presentation, and possibly a white paper, I am collecting concrete examples of how patents, patent searches, and strategic IP programs have made a direct impact on the bottom line in your organization.
We all have our horror stories of how companies spend millions on R&D, taking a product to the brink of a launch only to discover in the final stretch there is an infringement problem.
I would like to take a more positive angle and be able to present examples of additional revenue (or cost savings) based on an active IP program. What did you do to discover or promote the opportunity? Were other groups involved? How did you get management support? AND How much revenue was generated or saved?
My audience will be licensing executives, leaders of small and large technology companies, and information professionals.
All responses will be held in confidence...names will be changed to protect the innocent!
Please reply to the post or to my email below by March 1st. I will post summary data and a presentation outline for the group as soon as possible. Thanks for your help!
Regards,
Neal
Neal Rhutasel
IP Checkups
nrhutasel at ipcheckups dot com
www.ipcheckups.com
Comments (1)
Feb 08, 2010
Robert E. (Bob) Buntrock says:
Sometimes the searcher hears about the triumphs, but so often there's no feedbac...Sometimes the searcher hears about the triumphs, but so often there's no feedback whatsoever other than an occasional "good job, thanks".
Back in my 8 to 5 days, my clients were techies in research groups and only rarely were they in P&L. I supplied information of all kinds, esepcially chemistry and other sci/tech. Patents were included but more as part of the info portfolio needed for research. I also coordinated current awareness, especially with stored profiles on a batch service out of CAS. Several times, I was informed that these services really paid off. Once, an engineer and SDI user came with a problem. He'd been monitoring a key process with his SDI but the competition was trumpting a "new" breakthorugh process. Management was on his case asking why "we" had missed it. He didn't think we had but had me run a retro search to prove it. Sure enough, we discovered their patents, previously retrieved but discounted, that were cosmetic improvements on an even older, non-competitive process, hardly anything new or world beating. He was always a good client but was convinced for life of the value of information, even consulting with his alma mater after retirement, working on getting the CE department to be more information conscious, especially in patents.
Another time I got positive feedback with a dollar amount. The chemist user was at a decision point in process development and had to decide which of two apparently equally rewarding paths to take. Just then, the biweekly SDI output arrived and he discovered that one path was suddenly well covered by the competition. I don't recall the projected savings, but they were a sizable fraction of $1 million.
However, there's often bad news with the good. Later, when "re-engineering" (read downsizing) was rife, clients were going into hibernation. Since our budget (and hourly rate) was based on total cost recovery and we were faced with decreasing billable hours, the search group endeavored to secure testimonials on cost saving from use of our services. Customer management was running so scared that they denied any such cost savings (with the implication that we were totally unnecessary), including this case. This denial came from the "customer", the chemist's boss. The chemist/client/consumer was in agreement with me (and his prior testimonial) but had to remain silent. I guess documentation is always necessary.