On January 3rd David was honored to be a guest on the nationally syndicated The Small Business Advocate® radio show.
On January 3rd David was honored to be a guest on the nationally syndicated The Small Business Advocate® radio show.
On January 3rd David was honored to be a guest on the nationally syndicated The Small Business Advocate® radio show. Jim Blasingame and David discussed intellectual property goals for every small business in 2019. Use the players below to listen.
A few of the intellectual property goals that we discuss include:
1. Determine How Much Time and Money You Spend on Managing Your Intangible Assets Versus How Much Time and Money You Spend Managing Your Tangible Assets
Somehow most corporations rationalize having an entire staff to manage the tangible assets and not a single person dedicated to managing the intangible assets.
2. Budget for Intellectual Property Protection AND/OR Clearance for Each and Every Project / Product Introduction
Companies that have created successful intellectual property programs recognize that intellectual property protection should have a separate budget with the costs uniformly distributed across the company. Yes, setting aside a predetermined percentage of a project’s budget for intellectual property protection and/or clearance will be met with resistance but it is essential to establishing a culture where everyone recognizes and values creating, protecting, and exploiting intellectual property, while also reducing the risk of treading on other’s IP. For example, a company may establish that a certain percentage of the budget for new product development is set aside for intellectual property protection, including patent, trademark, and copyright protection, and clearance. After all, why spend money developing a new product that is not protectable and therefore can be copied by competitors, or worse yet, infringes someone else’s intellectual property?
3. Establish What You Are Going to do With Each Piece of Intellectual Property
All too often significant sums of money are spent protecting a hot project’s intellectual property only to have it gather dust on a shelf when a newer, hotter project comes along. Establishing a specific person, or group of people, responsible for capitalizing on each intellectual property asset goes a long way to minimizing money wasted on pet projects and maximizing returns on intellectual property assets.
4. Educate Your Employees on Critical Intellectual Mistakes to Avoid
Educating employees on simple intellectual property principles will provide a great return on investment.
5. Assign a Specific Person, or Group, the Task of Knowing the Competitions Intellectual Property
How can a company compete without actively following each move of the competition? This is particularly true in terms of following the intellectual property moves of the competition. Keep in mind that majority of this information is publicly available and very easy to access. One must have intellectual property integrated in the business plan. You must have an IP strategy so that your business is proactive, not reactive. Remember – if you haven’t strategically thought about where your industry will be in 5 years and identified several IP assets that you could develop to keep you ahead of the industry… you might be an IP loafer.
Small business owners often think that monitoring a competitor’s intellectual property is just too expensive or beyond their capabilities. Just the phrase “competitive intelligence” sounds expensive. In fact, investing an hour or two a week can return huge dividends; not to mention reduce the risk of landing on the receiving end of an IP lawsuit. Know your industry! Is it a litigious industry from an IP perspective? Is one particular competitor accumulating a lot of IP around a specific technology? If you don’t know the answers to these questions, it is time to get serious about monitoring IP.
6. Only Enter into Contracts that Clearly Define Intellectual Property Ownership, Rights, & Obligations
This goal dovetails with the previous goal of educating your employees on intellectual property mistakes to avoid. Everyone must realize that virtually every contract, whether it is for providing services or purchasing new machinery, will contain provisions directed toward intellectual property. Further, as it true with all contracts, the boilerplate clauses will always favor the party that prepared the contract, often to the extreme detriment of the other party. It is not uncommon to see boilerplate contracts that place all liability for intellectual property infringement on the purchaser! You have to be willing to walk away from work that places so much potential liability on you; sometimes the upside just isn’t worth the potential downside. When contracting with a business large enough to have a legal department, assume that the contract is transferring risk and liabilities to you. Clients are often surprised when I explain what I believe to be “The Single Biggest Intellectual Property Mistake of Small Businesses.” It’s not failure to protect your inventions, or failing to register a trademark to protect your brand, it is… signing “Boilerplate” contracts.