Posted to News on 14th Oct 2008, 00:00
Patents, IP and good old fashioned commercialisation
I don't know whether this is a wise thing to own up to, but there's only so long you can keep these little secrets to yourself before you succumb to the need to get it all out in the open. I can't really believe it's happened, because it certainly wasn't planned, expected, or even anticipated. But somehow I've found myself addicted to Dragon's Den, the BBC2 programme where hapless inventors and would-be entrepreneurs try to wrest tens of thousands of pounds of investment from the UK's leading venture capitalists, who are willing to invest their own money in exchange for equity.
>One of the big questions the five Dragons always ask their potential partners is how well protected their intellectual property is, particularly with regard to international patents on new ideas. More often than not, the entrepreneurs pitching for investment either have no patents at all, or at best have patents pending - with no real guarantee that the patent will ever be granted.
>This is always a turn-off for the Dragons, and you can hear the collective sharp intake of breath, which is only very slightly quieter than on the Harry Enfield and Paul Whitehouse pastiche of the show. Now, moving from the Shepherd's Bush to South Africa, just before Perth-based British Female Inventor of the Year Tanya Ewing stood up to address 1500 women inventors and innovators in Africa, she received a text message from her patent attorneys telling her that her US design patent application had just been granted. Even before that patent had been granted, her company had been valued at several million pounds, despite having generated very few sales at that stage. The valuation was based purely on the strength of the company's intellectual property rights, including its European patent, trade mark and registered design.
>Does anyone else find any of this slightly worrying? In all the focus on venture capital and valuations and patents, we seem to have lost sight of the product itself and bringing it to market. Getting a product patented can cost a heck of a lot of money and can tie you up in paperwork for months, if not years. In the meantime, the implication is that you market your product at your peril lest someone should try to copy it. But if you don't go ahead and market your product as soon as you're able, aren't you just opening the door for someone with a similar (or even a less well specified or less capable) product to come in and steal market share from under your feet?
>I found myself flitting around the Dragon's Den homepage, and out of interest clicked on a link to the European Patent Office. And guess what I found in large type at the very top of the page? The line "There's more to commercialising an invention than just filing a patent." Doesn't that say it all?
Becky Silverton, 14 October 2008
