Who Uses Intellectual Property Management Software?
Patent attorney: Intellectual property lawyers, specifically patent attorneys, use IP management software to handle their clients’ IP portfolios and effectively manage the application process for IP protections on behalf of their clients.
Inventors: Inventors, people that create new intellectual property, use IP management software to track the status of their IP-protection applications and trademark portfolios.
Corporations: Research and development personnel at companies utilize IP management solutions to handle their IP portfolios. These solutions are used in conjunction with patent research and analytics tools to provide an accurate picture of the current IP landscape.
Challenges with Intellectual Property Management Software
Software solutions can come with their own set of challenges. Here are a few related to intellectual property management software:
Integration: IP management solutions need accurate data to improve the IP management process. A given IPMS may not have a robust set of pre-built integrations that fit with the technology stack at a law firm or a company. A prospective buyer should vet the native integrations within any potential solution to avoid difficulties related to incompatible systems.
Data security: Data security, particularly for inventions and potential trademarks not yet protected by law, is vital for an IPMS. SaaS solutions must be managed carefully, and the attackable surface reduced and protected to protect valuable IP.
How to Buy Intellectual Property Management Software
Requirements Gathering (RFI/RFP) for Intellectual Property Management Software
Each company or law firm’s requirements list will look slightly different, but there is some core functionality that will remain the same. Docketing, workflows, and IP portfolio management should all be included in any IP management software solution. One of the major benefits of IP management software is streamlining IP-related workflows. To realize this particular benefit, prospective buyers should have a keen understanding of where and how a potential solution will fit into their existing tech stack, as well as how robust any integrations with patent databases are. Solutions with native integrations should float to the top of the list, while point solutions with limited interoperability should fall lower on any long list.
Certain IP management tools offer functionality above and beyond the core feature set that a buyer could expect to see in every solution in the category. Certain companies with a narrow target and a significant amount of research and development resources may value customizable analytics and reporting functionality more than others and should add that to the list of considerations. For law firms, client collaboration features, preferably in the form of single-pane, digestible dashboards, should be on the requirements list.
Compare Intellectual Property Management Software Products
Create a long list
Prospective buyers of intellectual property management software should create a long list of potential candidates based on the list of requirements they’ve compiled. The long list should include solutions that meet all core criteria and tools that provide functionality above and beyond the core feature set.
Create a short list
The short list should include solutions that the selection team feels are genuine candidates for purchase. The infosec and data privacy teams should vet the list and consider all integrations at this stage. If a solution doesn’t play well with the existing tech stack, IP management may be more difficult.
Conduct demos
The demo process should involve pre-built questions specific to the organization’s needs. If the team is going to be working with a dozen different clients simultaneously, the selection team should ask the demo to be set up to show how easy it is to manage those dozen portfolios within the tool.
Selection of Intellectual Property Management Software
Choose a selection team
The selection team should be composed of people using the software, namely lawyers, paralegals, and research and development professionals within the organization. IT should be involved in the selection process to weigh in on the interoperability of the software and how to best integrate the tool into the company’s technology stack.
Final decision
The final decision should be collaborative and take into account the size of the IP portfolio along with any intended growth, the types of users that will be using the software, the number of IP assets, the price point, and any interoperability considerations.
