Posts Tagged: "start-up"

At the same time that America’s business climate has become too acidic for a vast majority of domestic startups, the nation has also been losing its place in the global supply chain while other major global economies, like China’s, are becoming increasingly self-reliant… This report identifies trending emerging tech like virtual reality, augmented reality, machine learning, smart robots, gesture control devices, smart data discovery and virtual personal assistants, as well as consumer expectation levels and the length of time until the emerging tech becomes fully commercializable. As Aronoff noted, much of the innovation in those sectors relies on software. “Is that even protectable anymore?” Aronoff asked… With the new patent enforcement gauntlet in the U.S., what does it really take for a small company to protect its IP in the current system?

in hyper growth startups and other companies that rely on knowledge workers, the agenda for these value makers must remain as clear as possible. However, sometimes intellectual property (IP) creators inside companies get bogged down and cannot concentrate on the next breakthrough due to redtape. Bottom line: a corporate policy day of reckoning remains overdue… “I have observed large multinational corporations that did not have extensive policies and processes, and their workers were entrepreneurial and empowered,” says Cary A. Levitt, chief operating officer, Dennemeyer & Co., LLC, a worldwide partner in IP management with both legal and portfolio services. “They were trusted to use their judgment to make decisions. When the business environment became more competitive, the company implemented detailed decision-making processes. Each decision had to be vetted by one or more panels. Bigger the decision, deeper the assessment, longer the timeline.”

Barack Obama came to office with the suspicion that patents caused higher prices and created market inefficiencies. He set a mission to disassemble the patent system, which culminated in the America Invents Act… Obama supplied power to the market incumbents, thereby fortifying their monopoly power, while depriving market entrants of critical tools. By strengthening incumbents and their industrial oligopolies, he harmed competition from market entrants, policies that generated the slowest growth in history.

Bayh-Dole is running on autopilot without Executive branch oversight and U.S. patents are no longer the world’s gold standard. Without a course correction, we could be headed back to the bad old days… Bayh-Dole has become a driver of the U.S. economy. Every day of the year universities form two new companies and two new products from their inventions are commercialized. University spin out companies tend to stay in state becoming significant contributors to the regional economy… Bayh-Dole is a recognized best practice. The Chinese have adopted it while strengthening their patent system to better compete with us.

The validity of secondary markets for a variety of goods and services is never questioned. Securities are sold and resold many times after their initial offering, homes and buildings and built and resold many times, as are automobiles. A quick review of the products listed an eBay leaves little doubt that a robust secondary market exists for many goods and services across the American economy. However, not everyone is in agreement that a secondary patent market is beneficial. For some reason, many people villainize companies that practice patent licensing. Even resorting to the use of pejorative terms such as “patent troll” to describe these businesses. These detractors fail to account for the fact that inventors may not be the most efficient licensors. In addition, they don’t take into account that, just as a builder generates revenue to build more buildings by selling their current ones, companies that sell or license patents help fund further R&D with the proceeds.

NASA released 56 formerly-patented technologies to the public domain so that they can be used by commercial enterprises prior to their expiration. Patents released by NASA into the public domain were selected based on the low likelihood that the patents would be licensed by private enterprise because of low demand for resulting products. Other patents cover technologies that require further development before products are market-ready.

RUSS KRAJEC: Getting a patent is not the end goal. Using an issued patent is not the end goal. It’s the beginning for the startup. Think about how you are going to use this asset in your business, and then craft that asset to match that business goal. When you do that, you make much better use of your time and energy. So many people who are looking for a paper trophy or a plaque on the wall, and they don’t understand what they’re going do when this asset shows up, and if that’s the case, why bother doing it?

RUSS KRAJEC: The startup company has an exclusive license, so they have full control of the asset, and they have a buyout option that can be exercised at any time. And the buyout cost is reasonable, is predictable, and it’s known ahead of time. So from them, it is purely a matter of financing while the startup company has excruciatingly high cost of capital. Angel or venture money averages 30, 40, 50 percent per year. Our financing is much lower than that, it’s a better use of capital. If at some point in the future, the company may be able to get a bank loan where the cost of capital is much cheaper, and it makes sense to exercise the buyout option. The patent financing is purely an analysis of Net Present Value in these scenarios.

Believing that innovation does not come from risk taking inventors, entrepreneurs, start ups, or even from the likes of Silicon Valley, is naïve in the extreme. Unfortunately, this “you didn’t build that” belief system seems to permeate President Obama’s thinking with respect to innovation, and has trickled down within the Administration. This view is also shared by many in Congress too. Sadly, this fatalistic view removes the virtues of work and ignores the sacrifices it takes to succeed. Worst, such a world-view belittles risk taking, which is an absolute prerequisite to business success, particularly with respect to innovation.

Patents are a big capital investment for a startup company, but so is an office building. However, no startup company owns their office building outright. Even if they did own the building, they would take a mortgage on the building to free up capital. Exclusive licenses are the same thing as a lease agreement: the startup has full control of the assets, but does not have to spend capital to build or maintain the asset.

There are many examples of patents that had virtually no value because the claims were undetectable, unenforceable, or ridiculously narrow. In the process of getting a worthless patent — a bad patent, the company gave up their complete roadmap for how to manufacture and use their product. These bad patents are not just a waste of money, but their competitive advantage is eviscerated by disclosing everything they know. The bottom line: Some patent applications can be very damaging to a startup company.

The best patents are those that multiply an investment and actually generate money on their own… Standards essential patents are the holy grail of patents in today’s business landscape. Most startups are focused on getting a product to market quickly, getting validation, and starting a revenue stream. Once there, the startups begin to scale. If there is any chance that a startup’s technology – even a piece of it – could be incorporated into an industry standard, the patent needs to be investment-grade. In these situations, multiple patents would also be a good investment.

The first patent is typically filed prior to entering the market. This prophetic patent might have several different ways a product may be designed and capture a couple different ways the product may go to market. The purpose of the first patent application is to clear some space so that the company can keep competitors away. This patent application is done with the highest degree of uncertainty about both the technology and the market. It is critical to note that not only is the entrepreneur just beginning the journey at this point, but so is the patent attorney. Neither player knows which elements of the invention will turn out to be important.

BlueIron’s non-dilutive financing for startups pays all of the patent costs, including filing fees and attorney’s fees, using a conventional commercial “lease-back” arrangement. This model has been gaining traction since its first release in the fall of 2014. After financing professional poker player Phil Gordon’s patent for his new software startup, Chatbox, BlueIron has made investments in startup companies in software, hardware, biotechnology, medical devices, financial services, and agriculture.

AUTM collects quantitative data and facts about the benefits of university tech transfer, but the qualitative evidence is actually the most important. With the Better World Report, which just hit 500 stories, AUTM provides evidence that university tech transfer makes a better world. Just look at those stories in the Better World Report; they’re heartwarming. It is amazing that some of the critics tend to overlook or completely discount the very real stories of success. I don’t know what the critics are after— I guess the success of university tech transfer doesn’t fit the narrative that they wish to impose on everybody.