Myopia is generally what happens when unprecedented opportunities are placed before them. Those in the know generally do better than those in the worry. Consider Cetus, a startup biotech with a focus on a liver drug. The FDA delayed the approval of the drug, and a major funding crisis ensued. Chiron offered to take over the liabilities contingent on the sale of two patents (# 4,683,202 and # 4,683,195) to a third party, Roche Molecule for $300M (in 1993). This sale was stalled because DuPont challenged the validity of the patents, based on the formal claims written by the inventor (not a patent attorney), Kary Mullis. In the end, the soap opera turned out well for the investors with weak constitutions. For $300M, they sold the two patents to Roche, turned the company over to Chiron, and walked away. Kary Mullis won the Nobel prize for his invention embedded in these two patents, known as polymerase chain reaction (PCR) which allows DNA to be cloned. Over 4000 patents in biotech cite these original two patents. In our estimation, $300M represents "pennies on the dollar" valuation of these patents. The shareholders got a payday, and left the game. Roche on the other hand is thriving based on its intangible assets. Let IPstreet.com assist you.
The competitive landscape can be brutal, and commonly is referred to as the Red Ocean--you know, blood in the water with sharks lurking about (yeah, a few lawyer jokes come to mind, but I will restrain myself). Research at Harvard Business Review and elsewhere suggests that the most profitable business strategies are related to finding and/or creating Blue Ocean to reap rewards in a new space. How does that relate to studying patent data? Simple. You first need to understand what patents already exist in the invention-space. Second you need to understand and articulate how your invention is unique. Next you need to write your patent so it makes as many unique and new claims as it possibly can. Then you need to consider all possible opportunities to secure and expand your space. In IP lawyer-speak, this means that your invention needs to have a valid legal scope. If you find out, using our tools, that your invention is in a very competitive space (sharks in the bloody ocean), you may want to forego the costs associated with pursuing patent protection. IPstreet.com can help by searching millions of patents and simplifying the complexities of the data into an intuitive "scatter plot" that identifies your idea in context of the universe of patents and patent-pending applications. Ultimately, we can provide important business intelligence from the immense and excessive information available. Our goal is to take TMI (too much information) and report it to you which will better inform your business decisions. If you are searching for questions such as, "how to patent my idea, " or "how to patent my idea," then you've come to the right place. IPStreet.com's patent search tools are designed with you in mind. Using the patent search software, you can better understand how to patent your invention or patent idea, patent duration and find an experienced patent lawyers.
In Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution of the United States it says, " Congress shall have power [...] to promote the progress of science and useful arts by securing for limited times to inventors the exclusive right to their respective discoveries."
How can you separate "marketing fluff" from a true "value proposition" in this world of TMI (too much information)? This is not an easy question to answer, and we don't claim we have some magic crystal ball. We do, however, believe that our patent search tools are designed in such a way as to provide objective and transparent results to allow you to Discover, Measure, Compare, and Connect business opportunities. Many patent analytics tools are available. So what makes us different? Simple. We take the complexities and reduce them to meaningful visualizations. We take the complex legalese and simplify it to interpretable business intelligence to better understand the analytics of it.
Performing patent-searches comprehensively with the ability to Search-Review-Refine-Iterate™ is a fundamental benefit of our IP Street tools for you, the IP counselors of the world. IP Street has developed a unified search that makes boolean search at the USPTO seem like a tool from the stone age.