Underwriting, arbitration and litigation in IP. A really quick brief.
Intellectual property development, design and invention has historically rendered itself in various shapes and forms in all kinds of product lines and aspects of life. We have come far in the world on inventing, not only to improve our own bottom line, but also to give others the ability to reproduce and to profit through the distribution and resale of our IP development endeavors. Common law and IP law have blended hand in hand to identify boundaries and rule sets to where innovation stands, how one is rewarded, what to do when commonalities or overlapping occur to understand insight in the future of innovation is important. As mentioned in prior blog posts, IP is an important and vast field of objects that form outcomes, and how such objects act and interact define novelty and authenticity, however, we want to ensure the progress of innovation by not being penny wise and pound heavy at each node of development in anything we introduce, but rather deem the originator of reward and compensation for their work effort in such form that IP continues to push through the supply chain correctly.
Given IP debate, legality and decision making is never a perfect scenario and always a working effort to constitute the corrective methods and steps needed to ensure traceability is identified but also attempting to gather as many attributes as possible to link novelty, however we also look for the best method to push innovation to a point where it moves, it authenticates, prices stabilize and ownership is capped. But questions arise on what is the best method to ensure we are not greedy, inaccurately conclusive nor frugal on everything introduced from small to large in the IP depends on how we view and underwrite value lines. Currently, for US based notarization we’ve established first to file—given this method is still questionable and may need additional fine tuning, we invoke the ability to understand and question the filings thereafter in arbitration or court if questionable—the present future still renders newer ways and statutes to identify, authenticate and disperse IP ownership accordingly. One way this may happen is through AI driven identification of similarities and overlapping in design and formulas—whatever they maybe—from the beginning to end of the the supply chain structure may be calculated to cross check novelty.
First and foremost the goal of IP should be to push product development forward, but most importantly to negotiate and allocate the IP to the correct buyer for distribution, marketing and sales. It is the responsibility of the seller to ensure underwriting and evaluation is done correctly where this may also be done with the help of third party underwriters and brokers, the seller should understand that idea creation, prototyping and engineering are a small portion of the ladder work needed to be done in marketing and sales strategy to drive conversion, thus the terms of sale must be well defined with grace and aptitude—you won’t always get paid what’s best but you should go home with a decent lunch. Key attributes in IP identification, value, logic, terms and agreements may include:
- Understanding that an extensive amount of work will need to be done in manufacturing, partnerships, sales and marketing even when the IP is sold.
- Terms and licensing agreements must be well defined and agreed to before hand.
- Arbitration and negotiation before litigation.
- Sacrifices will need to be made on both buyer and seller side to get the IP to market but stills holds value to the originator.
- Important value lines should be looked at to litigate IP rather than small infringements and infractions that state the obvious. Good IP is novel and traced to an inventor beyond a reasonable doubt.
- IP is a constant work in progress, thus always good to insert a buffer or standard deviation for unknowns and pockets of error.