How to beat your competition by Leveraging your IP Assets

The 21st century is a playground of ever-changing ideas, dynamic concepts, empowering advocacies, and winning moments. The spirited minds of today’s generation are assertive, creative, and fast-forward, who are eager to discover the undiscovered, and unveil the hidden secrets of life.

As always, the competition for wide-range innovations demands you step up your game and formulate winning alternatives to succeed in the race.

Hence, even though your intellectual properties are intangible, you have the power to influence and shape the future of your future assets by leveraging them: a secret that best-selling authors, giant manufacturers, world-renowned inventors, and best tech companies have been practicing through time.

Identify, maximize, and protect your intangible assets now. This article will help you beat your competition by leveraging your Intellectual Property Assets.

Why You Need a Comprehensive IP Analysis

Today, the value of your Intellectual Property Assets are immeasurable. Ever since innovation became the impetus of the global industry, the competition for claiming IP ownership has scrambled companies to gather the most expensive patenting they can afford by learning how much a patent cost, trademark application, etc. As a result, start-up businesses need to file an earlier application to advance in building their IP portfolios, leaving established companies behind.

Here’s when leveraging becomes the trend. As a tried-and-tested IP strategy, leveraging defied the previous patent-frenzied method of protecting intangible assets.

Beating your competition by leveraging your assets needs a comprehensive IP analysis to help determine ways of exploiting your intellectual properties and its holdings in new and creative ways.

A comprehensive IP analysis is the process of identifying existing, even potential IP assets, enabling you to contextualize and assess effective strategies for making the best use of your IP assets. During this stage, you are creating awareness as to what you own, whether it be for sale, franchising and transfer, licensing purposes – or other purposes.

More importantly, always secure documents in your IP activities, which convincingly establish and defend ownership rights and claims, such as employee agreements, research and joint developments, etc.

How to Leverage your IP Assets

#1 Transferring IP Assets

Transferring IP assets take place via cooperatives, consortiums, or other confederations. However, these are not established assurances that your IP assets a third-party has the permanent handover of properties. In other words, a documented contract specifies a reversion clause, providing that those assets will be returned to their owners in the future.

Similar to licensing, however, transferring IP assets are allowing parties to close a sale rather than to franchise. Here, the buyer establishes a correct and proper value before agreeing to a contract.

#2 Franchising

Franchising is a capital-intensive option for you to expand your company. A great example is McDonald’s, which utilizes the efficiency of its brand’s values and goals through franchising its stores across the United States. As you observed, its trade name ranks as one of the top fast-food chains in the world.

Moreover, to have an efficient and long-term franchising, there are two things you need to consider.

First, your franchised product has to manifest a strong message and connection, supporting a well-defined value proposition through logos, symbols, trademarks, packaging, image, and all of those intangible elements. These IP assets increase your market and sales, as it influences your customers’ buying behavior.

Second, whether you are the franchisee or the franchiser, the latter must always provide the former by providing a system in consistently delivering a quality product and positive customer experience.

Lastly, the franchiser has to manage a profound support system in place, maintaining the streak of your business through your franchisee’s efforts.

Again, always remember that trust and cooperation between the franchiser and the franchisee are the two core values to achieve long-term franchises.

#3 Technology and brand licensing

Technology and brand licensing are the trend of most companies to leverage their IP assets. Similar to franchising, this method only transfers rights of use to a third party. That’s why licensees have to oversee and monitor the signed agreement to balance the reputation and interest with the licensor.

Why technology and brand licensing?

Beneficial ways of technology and brand licensing allows you to generate licensing fees and to project royalty income. With a very minimum costs of getting into the loop of marketing trends, you can identify the costs and risks associated with the development and distribution of your product.

However, licensing can be your immediate danger that could ruin your efforts overnight. For instance, when a licensee commits criminal and civil violation during transactions, the established status of your company will be ruined.

J.D. Houvener, a Patent Attorney in Washington, reveals that the licensing company has to conduct due diligence by imposing its quality standards and specifications to the licensee as a sustainable remedy.

#4 Strategic partnerships, alliances, cross-licensing, and co-branding agreements

Joining into joint ventures, cross-licensing, and strategic alliances help to form a feasible plan, which identifies common business objectives in leveraging IP assets. Regardless of how many companies involved in a partnership agreement, they must be bound to the specific purpose of alliance.

Here, you have to prepare and present development costs and project a feasible amount to flesh out an IP asset – may it be an invention, a machine, a business method, or a software. Once every party agrees, your company has distribution rights, and may acquire new capital.

#5 Co-branding and brand-extension licensing

IP asset holders have the option to leverage IP assets: to franchise or license. But now, you can co-brand and extend a brand under a license.

Straightforwardly, co-branding allows two companies to combine their original, unique ideas in coming up for new products and services. Still under a single brand, here, two parties are supporting each other. The target is to increase sales and market expansion. With that, co-branding leverages IP assets.

Also, brand extension leverages a brand equity of an established company, in a way that the product source remains the same. Unlike co-branding, brand extension only promotes the product through an extension, such as factors like trends and publicity.

Key Takeaways

Beating your competition by leveraging your IP assets is getting to know your business more. Whether you are a start-up, an established, a world-renowned, or an aspiring entrepreneur, recognizing your IP assets advances your way to a successful business.

The core of leveraging your IP assets is through conducting a comprehensive IP analysis. In this way, you enable yourself to identify, maximize, and protect your intangible assets, whether it be for sale, franchising and transfer, licensing purposes – or other purposes.

An outstanding IP portfolio creates a strong foundation to beat the competition. Thus, to execute a winning and sustainable ends, here are some proven IP strategies to leverage your IP assets:

1. Transferring IP Assets;
2. Franchising;
3. Technology and brand licensing;
4. Strategic partnerships, alliances, cross-licensing, and co-branding agreements; and
5. Co-branding and brand-extension licensing.

Author Bio:

Alejandro is a freelance writer, who collaborates with aspiring authors and editors for the past 3 years. He is passionate about equality and human rights. He intends to pursue a career in law.