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 [...]
Posts Tagged ‘Open Innovation’
2 Ways to Reduce Open Innovation Risk: Convert the Naysayers and Bring on the Seasoned Veterans
Open Innovation is risky. It’s like letting a stranger in your house to see what valuables are there for the taking, and letting them keep the key to your secrets even after you finish working with them. For some, this perception of risk is enough to stop any attempts of Open Innovation in its tracks. [...]
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 [...]
Success in Innovation Requires IP Counseling on the Front End: Here’s How to Make it Happen
The 2009 Open Innovation Summit was held in Orlando two weeks ago. The event was attended by corporate practitioners of Open Innovation, including people from P&G, GSK Consumer, Cisco, Whirlpool, J&J, HP (here are Phil McKinney’s slides), Clorox, and many others. Leading consultants in Open Innovation also attended, including Stefan Lindegaard of Leadership+ Innovation, Braden [...]
“It’s Not You It’s Them” or “They’re Just Not into You”: Why Being an Independent Inventor is Like Dating
The view that a good idea will result in a windfall for an independent inventor seems to be embedded in the fabric of US culture–perhaps it’s because the patent system dates from our earliest days. Indeed, a surprisingly large number of people think that getting a patent will result in a large company paying them huge sums of [...]
Reality Check for Inventors: Most Corporations Will Not Give Your Idea a First Look. Here’s Some Reasons Why.
Many people assume that corporations will readily consider good ideas from external sources, presumably because from the outside it makes sense to do so. That is, why should a corporation spend the time and money to create something from scratch if someone else has invented a product or technology that is a good fit and can be acquired [...]
Patent Attorneys Can Create Value-Added Services for Their Clients by Assisting with Open Innovation Efforts
As someone who assists corporations and entrepreneurs in monetizing their patents, I am continuously on the lookout for potential technology buyers. To this end, I subscribe to a number of services that provide “wish-lists” of technology that others are seeking to acquire. The most notable of these are Innocentive.com and Yet2.com. Recently, I have seen [...]
Companies Adopting Open Innovation Methodologies Must Incorporate Patent Information for Maximum Value Creation
Open Innovation is unquestionably becoming a “hot” area of focus for U.S. companies, especially in the current economic climate in which businesses are more than ever focused on smarter ways of doing business. And, why wouldn’t Open Innovation be an intriguing business model when companies can fill their product and technology pipelines for significantly lower [...]
Taking a Disciplined Approach to Protecting Innovation Investment Allows You to Reduce Legal Spends While Still Obtaining Necessary Patent Rights
This week, I am intrigued by what appears to be a recent convergence of reporting and blogging about the state of innovation in the US. There is an obvious concern by those who keep track of such matters that, in the current economic climate, government and business will “take a hatchet” to R & D [...]
The Coming Explosion of the Patent Monetization Market: Brought to You by Open Innovation and What Needs to Happen in Order to Speed Up the Process
This week, I got a call out of the blue from a very senior business development person at a Fortune 10 technology company “wanting to know more” about patent licensing and monetization. This was a bit strange: his company has literally dozens of patent professionals on staff, files 100′s of patents a year and, as I [...]