Tangible IP blog

In what is becoming a glut of interesting IP news at the moment, it’s reported today that MSFT and Salesforce have settled their patent spat. http://www.lanewsmonitor.com/news/Microsoft-and-Salesforce-com-Settle-Patent-Infringement-Lawsuits-1281020552/

It’s good speculation to wonder who the new troll on the block will bother with its new found confidence. The whole behaviour doesn’t feel very MSFT but you can’t disagree easily with the “if you can’t beat ‘em join ‘em” logic and approach.

A good spot from Heather Lycett of Blue Concept  on Twitter with a link to a Telegraph Online article. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comment/damianreece/7917572/Britain-must-get-serious-about-protecting-its-intellectual-property.html

Of course we agree, 100%, with the sentiment. We’ve previously commented that from our work, the UK seems behind even the best in Europe in seeing the value in IP, with the best in Europe being also behind the best in the World by several steps. Not yet too late but I’d personally prefer to see our new leader shouting about how the UK invests in what it’s good at and leading the World in IP in those areas than trying to haphazardly play Obama with only 1% of the charisma, and therefore only creating a negative impact on Brand UK. It’s not too late to apologise David, and I’d be polishing off my “Apologising for Dummies” guide, 2010 edition, before the Pakistani Prime Minister arrives this week.

Others are either more focused, business wise, or by the time we work it out, others will have captured all of the valuable IP real estate.  Wonder how this clear message could find its way into UK Government policy?

That didn’t take tool long. IV’s VP of Finance responded to Joff Wild at IAM Blog with what looks like a sensible explanation of the valuation given whilst at the same time, as of course any fund would, staying on the right side of their investors. http://www.iam-magazine.com/blog/Detail.aspx?g=509b4e21-db03-48d4-b5fd-de10cbf81f64

“The method UTIMCO has chosen to use in this reporting is not the measure we believe captures the value of our business. We don’t believe that our current cash flow, which we projected would be negative for many years as we build up our patent portfolios, signals that we are declining in value. To the contrary, given the bulk of our spending is on patent development, that spending is driving the growth in our value.” 

PR is a key part of IVs business. Creating wealth (or trying to) like a troll without looking like one seems like quite a delicate balance.  Quite a rapid reply  from IV but it would seem to be too early to judge whether this version of trolling pays or not.

Just because this is so interesting, take a look at this just posted on Twitter via Hunch founder Chris Dixon. http://techcrunch.com/2010/07/28/intellectual-ventures-negative-return/

I think we will be watching this one very carefully. As IV are typically very good at PR they should be responding any time now.

I’m in transit and not able to put out a full post on this one, but in the light of an increased focus on trade secrecy in our projects, this is an interesting story. Motorola seems to be claiming that Huawei systematically controlled 5 Motorola employees and directed them to steal Motorola’s confidential information. A fascinating story, fictional espionage or just the leaky IP reality of many Western businesses. http://www.domain-b.com/companies/companies_m/Motorola/20100724_intellectual_property.html

It’s been a matter of debate for a while whether or not patent trolls would be allowed to impact the introduction of clean and green technologies, and whether or not, morally and legally, pure patent owners would be able to seek ITC bans or injunctions for supposedly infringing technologies. “Surely not”, cries the voice of common sense, “we’re trying to save a planet after all”.

Well it looks like today common sense didn’t prevail and we took another backward step to giving in to the trolls with the the announced settlement of the Paice and Toyota litigation brought before the ITC.

http://www.buffalonews.com/2010/07/20/1117910/inventor-of-hybrid-vehicle-system.html

To be fair it’s not new news. Paice has been chasing Toyota for 6 years and Toyota has given in faced with the threat of a US ban on its products. But this is no genuine IP dispute as with the Handy Humper (see below), this is all about money, and all about how the legal system in the US can be played by lawyers.” It’s not pretty, it’s not balanced and it’s not fair, but it’s how the system works, we all know it’s fu***d but just accept it and move on..”…you can just imagine the senior counsel to Toyota saying to his CEO explaining the arbitrary tax that has just been imposed on the Prius.

We’ve said enough on the topic to date (in fact I don’t think we’ve talked about anything else since IPBC, in and of itself giving this worthless pursuit some air time that it doesn’t deserve) so this post is only for information.

Can US legislators really afford not to step in and bring some common sense here? Can litigation really be threatened to stop the Prius and other hybrids from entering the US market?  

Not that Mr Severinsky should not, with a valid patent, be denied (that’s a fair number of negatives in 12 words but you get the idea) some fair compensation for his invention. But he should not be able to threaten jobs should he? Or get some exorbitant tax awarded? Ri-dic-u-lous!

More, no doubt, to follow. Maybe next week we’ll find some positive IP news. I’ll search hard I promise.

A heavy heart....

Oh dear, oh dear. The NY Times reports overnight that those lovely trolls at NTP are back with a vengeance and on a new parasitic crusade to extort monopoly rent from the smartphone market. http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/07/09/smartphone-patent-suits-challenge-big-makers/

As any reader of this blog will know from recent posts I’m no lover of this sort of activity.  As ever the parasitic troll latches itself onto the larger more successful players in the market. Ron Epstein tries to sound like the credible defender of the little guy “these people are going to have to deal with our patents”. Oh dear, how boring is this all sounding!! Why don’t you just take your $612.5m and go and do something worthwhile with it, like feeding a few starving children or sponsoring a few wells in African villages?

I had heard at IPBC that NTP’s patents had been largely wiped out in re-examination (can’t recall who said that?) but it seems not and enough of their key claims are still standing to allow them to issue a whole bunch of new threats. You know who I feel sorry for in this situation, poor Apple, who, as now the world’s most influential (back off from most successful but it’s arguable) gets more than its fair share of parasites. And all because they have the World’s most sexy, most popular and most in demand products.

I also met with Eran Zur and Thomas Westerlund from RPX at IPBC. I can’t quite recall if Apple is on their member list but I’d like to see the poacher turned gamekeeper approach to NTP and how successful this might be. Expect to see or hear rumours of visits to NTP by RPX. From meeting Eran and from market rumours it is said that he’s one of the world’s best negotiators. This could actually turn out to be fun.

Unfortunately however it’s all a lot of a sideshow and damages the credibility of IP as a brand and its ability to crawl into being viewed as an asset class. Joren and I are writing this month in IAM Magazine on the subject of “Copyright as the orphan IP right” (well he’s writing it, I’m credited for a few small but pointed contributions) and it is fascinating to contrast how innovation in and around the copyright world contrasts with that in the patent world.

Too many current and ex-lawyers in and around patents I’m afraid. What was the old lawyer joke? Actually there are tons but this one is pretty apposite—

A physician, an engineer and a lawyer were arguing about whose profession was the oldest.

The surgeon announced, “Remember how God removed a rib from Adam to create Eve? Obviously, medicine is the oldest profession.”

The engineer replied, “But before that, God created the heavens and the earth from chaos, in less than a week. You have to admit that was a remarkable feat of engineering, and that makes engineering an older profession than medicine.”

The lawyer smirked, and said, “Who do you think created the chaos?”

 Ha ha…very totally unfunny. Can somebody with a tiny degree of credibility sort these crazy kids out before they wreck the house for good?

A nice spicy story in the New York Daily News today.

http://www.nydailynews.com/money/2010/07/02/2010-07-02_sextoy_makers_patience_reaches_climax.html. It would be an easy and cheap shot to follow the editor of the site and try a few double-entendres (fnaar, fnaar-gosh I’ve just remembered Finbarr Saunders  from Viz, left–is Viz still going?) but the heart of the story is about how powerful IP can be in just about any market. And this, apparently, is a very large market.

The reference to the ITC is one that anyone who knows IP in the US will know well. The International Trade Commission is a quite excellent way to use IP to stop foreign imports at, or actually before, they get to the US border, described here in Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_International_Trade_Commission

You can just imagine the male patent attorney who wrote the patents smirking and sniggering Finbarr style at the unique and non-obvious features of his client’s products. But when the impact is that the Handy Humper and the Travel Honeypot are stopped from entering the US market (that one was not deliberate but I really should take it out in the next edit) one can begin to see that IP makes its mark in most every business and market.

Oldman-baddie

I can’t leave Munich without a comment on that NPE session. Picture the scene. Have you ever seen the film the Fifth Element? Gary Oldman, the excellent Gary Oldman, plays the baddie, the ultimate capitalist owner of everything sold or produced worldwide, everyone’s boss. He tips a glass from his desk, breaking it on the floor of his office, little robots come out from the walls, one a hoover, one a dustpan, one to wash, one to polish, all to demonstrate to Bruce Willis, the hero, how chaos and disorder is good as it gives us mindless humans a range of purposes and keeps us busy.

I’ve just sat through the IPBC session titled “Getting to Grips with NPEs”. Now that was a session which generated real emotion in me, and showed how amazing us humans are at spending time and effort on things that are ultimately meaningless.

I went through a large range of emotions. I started out neutral . Here we go, just another session about trolls, trolls justifying why even trolls do social good (we help small inventors make money from their IP!-well done, good for you), lawyers arguing over technicalities (rule 11, blah, blah blah), the anti-troll lobby screaming about how unfair the system is to allow this abuse and Dan McCurdy (we’ll come back to him later) giving his troll stats.

I quickly got into irritated. Mainly as the session was dominated by American accents justifying their respective positions. Mild anger soon followed. More American accents, more justification, more self-justifying arguments.

Soon followed by seething. Vigorous agreement with Nokia (great speech, really great speech Dr Schneider) and Technicolor (ex Thomson, good “I hate trolls” speech Beatrice de Russé). I found myself wanting to applaud. C’mon the anti-troll lobby!!!There was little room for middle ground in the room. And, for me, the anti-troll camp has my lifetime vote.

Why? Well it is quite simple really. With one very limited exception (genuine lone inventors) I concluded that the whole troll business model is just so lacking in any creativity or social worth. I found myself asking “What went wrong in these people’s childhoods or lives to lead to a conclusion that they can look themselves in the mirror and believe that they are doing anything good?”. Daniel Papst by the way gave a good human explanation if I understand their heritage, gamekeepers turned poachers.

And then I realised I owe slashdot an apology for ever expressing any admiration for organisations that create nothing. So here I am, saying sorry and asking for forgiveness for my error. I’ve now seen the inside and see how futile it all is.

The one exception that one has to make and should make it for the small and lone inventor. He/she deserves reward if he is the godfather/mother of a new technology that creates wealth. He or she, exceptionally, deserves a fair reward. The rest of you, have you really got nothing better to do?

Dan McCurdy is a legend in the IP world. An IBMer under Marshall Phelps, a licensing expert/jobbing consultant in Thinkfire (I’m sure I recall his profile with a dollar amount against his face for his lifetime licensing dollars generated), now AST. But how can these two statements be reconciled? Statement 1, timed at about 46 minutes in “I would be delighted to close down AST tomorrow if the NPE problem went away!!” (hooray!!), and then, at around 58 minutes in “When we buy patents in for our AST members, we commit to sell them within 12 months, and we sell them to the highest bidder, we sell to operating companies, aggregators, and….to NPEs”.

Excuse me, come again….WHAT!!! You perpetuate the problem by selling on patents, to NPE’s, who can then sue those who don’t have licenses as they aren’t your members.

Go back to the first image of Gary Oldman in the Fifth Element. What peculiar beings we are. Like my kids when they’ve nothing better to do they create chaos until a parent says stop. This really does need some high up parent to say stop. The US risks damaging its credibility as a country by this worthless pursuit, threatening new innovations by imposing a totally arbitrary and senseless tax created by some out of control kids. If we have anything we in Europe we can do to stop this catching on in Europe, we really should.So sorry Slashdot again, I got it badly wrong. I apologise.

There is nothing to admire in this.

In short, not much really new though a hint that the mass is moving away from talking only about patents (still a strong sub-theme to everything but at least the minds are opening) to a wider defintion of IP. Step by step.

Nir Kossovsky was excellent on reputation. A substantive move forward. Wayne Sobon was just crystal clear and highly contextual.

The Hall of Fame dinner was a privilege. Henry Blanco White’s acceptance for his father was totally charming and very English. Paul Michel’s speech was humble and modest for such a successful person.

I enjoyed our panel session. Three founders and myself. Carmen described herself as “the boss and the cleaner”. Joe is infectious and may well be an IP asset on his own. Johan I know turns out the lights and locks the doors before he goes home. All very talented but modest people. It was a super experience to be able to share the stage with them. Thanks to Joff and IAM for the invitation.

Well here we are at IPBC (the IP Business Conference) 2010 in Munich at the (it has to be said) very very nice Bayerischer Hof hotel. Perhaps a touch on the pricey side for Brits paying in pounds but nevertheless very nice.

I’ve already seen a few of the IP community around, Joff Wild looking very calm over Sunday breakfast and the giant Bo Heiden towering over the diminuitive Bruce Berman.

This is a good event to attend. Joff tries very hard in the program to cover a wide variety of tastes and interests with a dedicated theme. This year we  have a specific plenary session dedicated to SMEs which I’m very much looking forward to presenting on and giving our view of the IP world from the bottom of the market.

I’ve not heard Nir Kossovsky speak or met him so I’m looking forward to that. It will also be interesting to hear Gerard from IPXI-I wonder how close they’re getting to turn another Jim Malackowski vision into a reality. IVs charm offensive continues with Vincent Pluvenage here-intriguing title Vincent (General manager of strategic acquisition, alliances & private equity)-wonder what all that means?

I always like to see at these conferences if (1) anyone is saying anything new (2) there are any new kids on the advisory block. One of my themes tomorrow will be that patents are losing their grip as the weapon of absolute choice in SME land. I’ve challenged Richard Buttrick who’s facilitating our SME session to see if we can get through 90 minutes and not mention patents more than 5 times.

Look out for some tweets.

Andrew, Rob, and I are all in Munich for the IP Business Congress this week. Look out for Andrew on a panel with his fellow IAM 20 members Richard Buttrick and Joe Beyers together with Johan Feenstra of Liquavista, and Carmen Vela of Ingenasa, and discussing SMEs and IP on Monday.

Our friend Ben Lehman of Think IP Strategy will be moderating a panel on
“Working together” on one of my favourite topics, open innovation on Tuesday. Ben kindly hosted me on a recent IPThinkTank podcast on Apple’s IP strategies, and I hope to catch up with him on the latest developments in all things Apple.

If you’re in Munich and want to catch up about IP and IP strategy (or BBQ, if you happen to cook), please grab me for a chat.

Some of you may know the slashdot website, which is always good for a provocative discussion about patents and their value. Their latest entry identifies a newly granted US Patent 7,739,139 assigned to Amazon and which claims a social networking system. The entry is slightly wrong since it suggests that the application which was filed in 2008 originates from that date, but the continuation data shows that its original pedigree goes back to a 1997 filing issued as US Patent 6,269,369.

The slashdot entry concludes that the well-known Facebook CEO will have to “open a can of patent whup-ass” (whatever that is).

The claims of the patent certainly seem on face value highly relevant to all social networking websites:

1. A computer-implemented method, comprising: receiving and storing personal data of a first user of a computer-based service, said computer-based service accessible to users over a network, said personal data specified by the first user; providing a user interface for users to establish contact relationships with other users of the service such that each user can have one or more contacts, said user interface enabling a user to identify other users of the service, and to selectively initiate the generation of requests to establish contact relationships with the identified users; receiving a request from a second user of the service to establish a contact relationship with the first user, said request submitted to the service over a network via said user interface; sending a notification of the request to the first user over a network; providing an option, in connection with said request, for the first user to grant permission for the second user to view at least some of the personal data of the first user; and in response to the first user granting said permission, providing the second user access to at least some of the personal data of the first user via a contact information user interface of the service, such that the second user is provided access to data that would not otherwise be accessible to the second user via the service; wherein the method, including receiving and storing the personal data, providing the user interface, receiving the request, sending the notification, providing said option, and providing the second user access, is performed by a server computer system.

I haven’t yet had the chance to read the patent in its entirety, but the examination record is frustratingly short. There’s a note of an interview that took place with the Examiner, after which the patent was granted. No major correspondence at all (but you would not want to put too many comments on record, in case they came back to haunt you later).

So what’s Amazon going to do with this patent? Who knows? I think it’s unlikely that they are going to try and shut down Facebook (after all they have a fan page. More likely it’s going to an interesting tool to defend itself against alleged patent infringements and maybe even providing some good old licensing revenue.

And what happens if Bilski comes out? Well, my guess is that the Examiner has already had in mind some idea of what the Supreme Court will say in Bilski. The claim is full of structural features and it’s going to be difficult to dismiss the claim as “a business method as such”. Indeed it certainly passes the US PTO’s “machine or transformation” test. So my guess is that the patent would at least be held valid under whatever test is conducted in the future. The interesting thing is whether anyone can find prior art out there which predates the 1997 filing of the patent application. That will be more difficult.

Technorati Tags:
Facebook, Social Networking, Software Patent, Amazon, Software Patents, Bilski

It’s been a couple of interesting days in Oviedo, Spain, at the first Nanofutures conference launching the European Technology Integration and Innovation Platform (ETIP) in Nanotechnology. The ETIP is designed to be Europe’s forum for research and commercialisation of nanotech products and the conference was well attended by a number of European Commission officials and Spanish politicians. Indeed it was a little strange for this participant to participate in a scientific event at which the police were out in force, presumably to protect the (more important) participants.

I spent a lot of time talking to others in the conference about their work in nanotechnology and commercialising their efforts. A lot of the posters in the hall outlined some very basic research which is probably years from commercialisation, but there was also a fair share of small start-up companies (often from universities) who were looking for business (and often investment). The understanding of intellectual property issues varied tremendously. One conference speaker from a company based in Santander highlighted the importance of good patent protection, not only in Spain but also in other countries. She emphasised the need to get good IP advice from the very beginning.

Another speaker (who shall remain nameless) talked about the success his company was having but failed to deal with any questions about how the technology was protected. His company has no patents (at least none published on the ESPACENET database) and some of the technology seemed fairly easy to reverse engineer (but I’m only a mere Physicist and not a real Nanotechnologist). In that case one wonders how the company is protecting its long term value in intellectual assets

Walking around the exhibition and poster wall was fascinating. Some of the people I talked to really understood the value of the intellectual property developed. Others noted that they thought a patent had been filed or that they’d filed a description with a notary to protect their ideas. There seemed to be little appreciation at the conference of the need to identify and review the intellectual property developed and the most appropriate form of protection.

A patent application is only of value if it really protects the business model of the company. Filing a patent on a process so that competitors receive full details of the process (as one company has clearly done) without thinking through and protecting use cases, licensing programmes and business opportunities is often a waste of money and resources. Traditionally some companies had filed details of their ideas with a local notary and relied on these deposits to “prove” that they have prior rights to an invention. That may have been a good strategy when markets are local – but in a global business strategy it has little role to play. Prior use of an idea in Spain does not protect a company from an alleged patent infringement in the United States (or even in France). And it is also not a substitute for a functioning trade secrets policy in which a company polices its disclosure of confidential information.

One research institute revealed that they had been somewhat surprised to find that a former student had put software developed at the institute into the Internet, apparently without permission. They had been looking to commercialise some of the work and if the software continued to be available free of charge there might be little incentive for anyone to take a licence.

There were a few bright spots. Rob met an old acquaintance from German-based seed company Technostart who is involved in the EU’s ProNano project which aims to take thirty ideas through to commercialisation. She’s well aware of the need to ensure that a company’s intellectual property is well-developed. I was also there in my role as Co-Chair of the Licensing Executives Society International’s (LESI) Electronics, IT and Telecommunications committee. LESI runs a number of educations programmes on the bsuiness of intellectual property which are suitable for smaller companies. Together with his friends Jose Miguel Lissen, a patent litigator at Spanish IP firm Gómez-Acebo & Pombo, and Dario Santander from Bardehle’s Barcelona’s office, we’re looking at what value membership of LESI could offer nanotech entrepreneurs in the commercialisation of intellectual property.

I was giving the third of the EVCA’s IP masterclass webinars last Monday and was able to cite Joff Wild’s reference to Fluxxion in the IAM blog just in time. http://www.iam-magazine.com/blog/Detail.aspx?g=98c6a99a-4719-4a3f-84b0-9932428ef94e

Fluxxion, http://www.fluxxion.com/,  is one of those apparently rare European early stage entities where IP strategy and implementation is driven from the top. I don’t think though this is as rare as it first appears. We’re 150+ projects old now and finding that many more CEO’s and investors than even a year ago are insisting that their businesses use a company like ours to help them to consider and frame the most appropriate IP plan.

I should keep track of our project numbers and see if we can track further progress against our accumulated number of engagements. We’d hope to be 50 further on by this time next year and I’m just hoping that the trend of the last 6 months continues. We’ve never been busier, never had more complex and challenging projects and never had a bigger and better work pipeline. It’s been a long time coming I promise you.

I’m off to Germany this week to take in a project followed by IPBC in Munich where the IP community collects. http://www.ipbusinesscongress.com/2010/. I’m meeting up with an old friend Giancarlo Migliori (aka Mr GoodIdea and Mr Bad Name) for breakfast on Tuesday. We first met on a visit to see Jim Malackowski and the Ocean Tomo team in 2007. It feels like several lifetimes ago.

I’m going to IPBC to speak but also to make some new contacts. We’re thinking long and hard about how to grow our business geographically and specifically for me I’d love to meet up with anyone thinking about IP strategy in emerging economies like the BRICs countries.

As a large yoga fan (Bikram is my thing—can’t recommend it more highly, in fact thanks to Jordan for positioning our London office right next to a studio) this caught my eye in today’s Telegraph online.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/india/7809883/India-moves-to-patent-hundreds-of-yoga-postures.html

I agree with the sentiment expressed by the Indian government spokesman. Like France with real champagne (another of my weaknesses) or the Spanish with flamenco, the British with soccer (I’d much rather he’d said cricket or rugby, but I’ll give him football too), many countries invent and create things which are a deep part of their cultural heritage, and then those things in an ever smaller world get exported and adapted.  We Brits have to be proud and are self-deprecating about how we gave the World so much then find that the World takes us on and beats us at it.

But attempting to patent an form of physical and spiritual exercise that is more than 2000 years old? As an IP strategist I think you’re taking the wrong tack on protection India. And I think you may have a prior art problem.

Surely one better approach is the French one with champagne. Real champagne can only come from the Champagne region of France and nowhere else…everything else can be produced using the champagne method but isn’t champagne and can’t be called champagne.

Or alternatively go the British route of open innovation without protection (I’m not claiming this to be a deliberate strategy by Britain, more than it happened by default). Give your inventions to the World on the basis that everyone knows Great Britain invented these sports (or the multitude of other great things we gave the World), and attributes value to the country and its heritage as a result. Worldwide, British inventorship is still admired and lauded. There is surely some hidden intangible and brand value in this.

Does anyone with half a brain think that yoga was invented anywhere other than India? It certainly gives me as a beneficiary a warm feeling about India as a country. Personally I think the open innovation route, whilst making sure that the World knows it was India that gave this invention to the World, is a way better way of thinking about the problem.  I’d then accept with open arms the compliment that vast numbers of people of diferent colours, creeds and ages found MY invention to be part of their lives.

Spread it and nurture the Indian way as the genuine and original way. Don’t go the patent route..you may end up being labelled a troll which is very un-Yoga.

It would be an interesting IP strategy project without a doubt.

The ABA Journal is reporting (via Bloomberg) that a former partner at law firm Kirkland and Ellis has purchased 4,500 patents and is starting an NPE (or troll, depending on your attitude towards these things).

John Desmarais is a “Billion Dollar Lawyer” (according to Bloomberg) who practiced (what else?) patent litigation. So he’s flipped sides from working for operating companies to becoming a “non-practicing entity” himself. The patents come from Micron Technologies, so presumably the majority lie in the computer memory space though apparently he bought some that cover “photo imaging, telecommunications and search engine technology, plus the largest single cluster of radio frequency identification [RFID] patents.”

The 4,500 number sounds crazily high for a first purchase, but I’m guessing this is just patents and not 4,500 patent families, though I suppose with Micron you never know (especially as the Bloomberg article also mentions 800 patents). The difference is that patents are inherently national rights, and so one patent filed in your home jurisdiction and then filed in a whole slew of foreign jurisdictions results in multiple patents. The whole thing – all the individual national patents related to a single patented technology – form a “patent family”.

The deal is structured with a patent holding company that will use Desmarais’s new law firm for its enforcement work. The patent holding company, Round Rock Research LLC, is according to Patent Freedom now the second largest NPE. The largest is of course Intellectual Ventures.

I’m assuming Desmarais must have got some sort of investment to get going with this, but given his background, maybe not? It sounded like Micron needed some cash, and maybe he cut them in on a percentage of licensing revenues to get a better deal? Just speculation of course, but one to watch.

I’m also wondering what his plans are for Europe?

Here is an interesting news item from Twitter today.

http://www.inthenews.co.uk/news/music/music/force-india-sues-lotus-f1-for-breach-of-intellectual-property-$21378971.htm

Intriguing. Isn’t it?  In a market where IP comes and goes fast, season by season, F1 is highly innovative but not to my knowledge a big patent filer. Which may be why Force India is using a more esoteric legal right to try to enforce its rights.

More to follow. I’ll ask our resident F1 nut Chris to comment.

It’s hard not to watch the news this morning (on that fantastically British medium, the BBC, we do that so well don’t we, the Royal Family, the Open, the Championships) without some fear for Brand Britain. We also specialise so well in shooting ourselves in the foot. Time, after frustrating time.

BP’s failure to stem the leak in the Gulf is an environmental tragedy, with the associated sight of American citizens standing on British flags. If we have a special relationship with the US, we as a country should be using the innovative talent, all innovative talent at our disposal to find a way to stop this. And fast. The long term damage to the US coastline and marine systems is heart-breaking to see.

Take then BA. Does nobody in Unite or BA management not see how they are systematically taking apart a brand that has taken decades to build up?  At a time when competition has not been fiercer and profits never harder to come by. Bridge the gap…JFDI. If BA and Unite can’t bridge it, Mr Cameron, this has to be in the National interest. If they won’t then remove the B from their name as they don’t deserve it.

Quite how the Daily Telegraph believes that it is in the National interest to keep running expenses stories is beyond me. Does anyone believe that the new Laws and Alexander stories are new? Or have the Telegraph been holding them waiting for a damaging time to use them?  Stupid, self-interested journalists with nothing but destruction in mind. Another systematic picking apart of our national self-esteem.

To find another IP angle I saw this in the Guardian today. http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/may/31/mergers-acquisitions-vince-cable

If you really look behind foreign takeovers of UK firms, what are people buying? Answer—British IP  and intangibles. From Tata’s acquisition of JLR (brand, innovative skills, know-how bought at a monster discount) to SAICs of Rover (ditto, except all of the valuable Rover formal IP for close to nothing), to Kraft’s of Cadbury (generations of heritage and a fantastic brand), to the Qatari government’s buying Harrods (albeit from Mr al-Fayed), to football clubs now owned by a slew of Billionaires of varying integrity, what on earth are we going to have left when we finally wake up and realise we’ve sold all the shop?

I do fear. I really do fear. As a message to David Cameron, please work out and fast what we as a country are good at. There are things, innovation, heritage, some technologies, banking, tradition, integrity. And really focus on our brand values and what makes people want to keep coming to the UK and dealing with the UK. Focus on them and nurture them, be seen when they are under threat, be vocal when they are to be praised. Either that or you’ll be able to switch off the lights when it’s time to close up.

Omigosh what a big IP news week. So much to talk about all condensed in one week. If I didn’t know the IP market better I’d almost call it a wave.

Thanks to one of our IP ambassadors, Giles Peddy at Hotwire PR http://www.hotwirepr.com/company.html we came across this today. Under the compelling title

Firms with strong intellectual property strategies fare better in raising capital

“Patents alone not enough, says MIT Sloan School of Management senior lecturer.”

CHECK…IT…OUT! MIT validate our business model.

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2010/intellectual-property-strategies.html

I love the title. Love the first few paragraphs. Love the essence of the story. Then, oh no……….it turns into just another patents story.

It is still a great read. Still worth talking about, but to repeat, IP is not all about patents, and it’s not Mr Hadzima Jr, even just about managing patents better. IP is much much wider, and goes right to the heart of what makes a business special and sustainable. Often this is half a dozen items of core know-how, or a core skill or a relationship. Where patents are the most appropriate form of protection, I totally agree with the conclusion. But it is only a small part of the intangibles story. And let’s be truthful, many companies seeking investment only file patents because they’re seeking investment. Not because they truly believe in the system.

I’ll be using this piece of quality collateral though wherever I wander. Thank you Giles.