As a “recovering patent lawyer,” I now realize that I wasted a whole lot of my clients’ money over the years because of the inherent inefficiencies that have been built into patent practice. In this regard, I wrote about the money wasted by old fashioned patent filing systems in this post a while back, a [...]
Posts under ‘Patent Staffing’
Patent “Expert” Opinion on Reasons for Google Tender Offer for Groupon Reveals Fundamental Problems with IP Professionals
After several years of writing about how business leaders need to wrest control of their IP matters from lawyers, today brought a revelation that illuminated why this seems to be such a hard point to get across. It should be a no brainer: it has been shown time and time again that when a company [...]
Want to Know More about IP Strategy? A Selection of Posts for In-House and Outside Counsel
This week, I am speaking at the Midwest IP Institute. I will be participating in a “fire side chat” with my good friend, Edna Vassilovski of Stoel, Rives LLP. Our session is entitled “How Patent Prosecutors and In-House Counsel Can Provide Work Product Better Aligned with Client’s Business Needs.” Specific topics we will discuss include: [...]
An Innovation Expert Sticks Up for IP Lawyers!
Regular readers of this blog know that I strongly believe that IP lawyers can do a whole lot more to better serve the needs of innovation teams. Much of the disconnect between what IP lawyers do and those of their innovation clients can be traced to misalignment of incentives, as well as a structural and [...]
Corporate Business Leaders: Want to Create Value from Your IP? Stop Making it Your Lawyers’ Problem.
One of the biggest complaints I get from corporate innovation and product development professionals is how risk averse their lawyers tend to be about dealing with intellectual property (“IP”) issues. It doesn’t matter whether these business people are talking about their outside or in-house lawyers, either. To a person, the complaint generally tracks the contention [...]
IP Lawyers: Enough about Bilski Already! Instead, Start Spending Time on Things that Create Value for Your Clients
Clear your calendars! Bilski was decided just a few weeks ago, and already the schedule is filled with at least 3 Lunch and Learn seminars in the Atlanta area about “what Bilski means to your practice.” If you can’t make these due to your Summer vacation schedule, don’t worry: there are countless blog posts and [...]
IP Strategist on the Radio: 2 Recent Interviews
As my consulting practice becomes ever more busy, blogging must be relegated to times when client work is not pressing–that ever-elusive free time. But now that Summer is here, free time has been hard to come by–it’s hard to write when at the pool with the kids or driving to Grandma’s house–but I haven’t been [...]
Innovation is Sprouting in US Patent Office: A Plea for Flexibility from Patent Practitioners and Interested Parties to Allow the Necessary Changes
Anyone who has practiced IP law for a few years can attest to the transformations happening in the US Patent Office over the last year. In my opinion, Director Kappos is more than a breathe of fresh air over his predecessors, he actually knows what he is doing! Also, regardless of what one may think [...]
Patent Applicants: Get Your Attorney on the Phone to the Examiner–NOW!!!
A couple of couple of weeks ago, I wrote a detailed post about how the US Patent Office seems to be in a deal-making mood. Today, Dennis Crouch of Patently-O posted data that demonstrates that in the last weeks, the Patent Office has issued more patents than in any 2 week period in history! We [...]
Google Changes the Game Again–This Time for Patent Owners and Those Who Serve Them
Patrick Anderson of the great Gametime IP blog reported the details of Google’s new prior art searching tool*. This is such important news, I thought it important to repeat it in a separate post. Patrick provides detailed instructions for how to use the Google patent searching tool, and I will not repeat that information [...]