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Using IP Strategy to Reduce the Strategic Uncertainty of Business Decisions

In my wanderings through the Internet, I recently came across a new-to-me management concept. This concept, which generally addresses the management of the risk of strategic decisions, directs C-level corporate decision-makers to embrace as a primary responsibility the management of uncertainty in order to enable the long-term success of their companies. The concept, developed by Michael Raynor of Deloitte Research, is briefly discussed in this article entitled "What is Corporate Strategy, Really" (available here: http://www.iveybusinessjournal.com/article.asp?intArticle_id=722) and in more detail in a book entitled The Strategy Paradox (more info here: http://www.amazon.com/Strategy-Paradox-committing-success-failure/dp/0385516223 ). In the article, Mr. Raynor effectively asserts that traditional models of corporate strategy are flawed because they are inherently based on a supposed understanding of future events. Instead of embracing the fallacy that they are able to predict the future, business leaders should acknowledge and accept that a significant aspect of corporate decision making is based upon planning

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Who Cares if the Patent System is Broken? Making Lemonade from the Patent Office’s Lemons

Is the patent system broken? I am now an IP Strategist and owner of a patent strategy and consulting company, however, I spent many years in the trenches working to prepare and file U.S. and foreign patent applications for large and small companies of varying levels of sophistication. From my experiences, there is no doubt that there are fundamental problems with the U.S. patent system, as well as the patent systems of other countries. As one example, I frequently experienced frustration dealing with patent examiners who clearly did not understand the basic rules of patentability, even when these rules are clearly spelled out for all to see in their manual. In recent years, it started to seem that I was dealing with the "no patent office," instead of the Patent Office.This blog post is not about the problems with the patent system, however. The reality is that the patent system is

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Patent analytics devoid of the competitive and business insights embedded in the claims are worthless

First generation patent analytics methodologies viewed patent documents as containing information that needed to be collected, culled, reviewed and graphed. This approach considered patents as data sources. This permitted large volumes of patent data to be collected and nicely packaged, irrespective of the reason that the patent filer undertook the effort and expense to make the filing.Significantly, companies do not typically disclose valuable trade secret scientific and technical information to their competitors—as required in a patent filing—without having a defined business-related purpose for such effort and expense. As discussed above, the claims of a patent document reveal what the patent filer seeks to own in a patent application or does own in an issued patent. The business purpose of a patent filing is only truly decipherable from an understanding of the subject matter of the claims. Omission of claims analysis from patent analytics thus ignores the critical business information present