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In This Issue
The Value of a Patent
How ITTr is Different
Reading the Customers Mind
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 Newsletter - May 2011
  This newsletter is for the benefit of: our customers both current and past, our workers , board members and friends including those of you we haven't talked to recently. Please feel free to forward to others who might be interested in our activities

The Value of a Patent

 

 

Recently I've received several questions from customers about the value of patents.  When a customer spends a substantial amount of money to obtain a US patent (and much more for international patents) , that customer expects a return on their investment.

 

What exactly then does the customer get for his money.  This is a tricky question because a patent is not the primary asset, the invention is.  A patent just grants legal title to the invention.

 

In that sense a patent is like the deed to a house.  The deed , like the patent,  is just a piece of paper.  The house is what is worth the money,  but without the deed the owner has no right to sell the house or live in it.

 

So the first point, in establishing value of a patent is to establish the value of the underlying  invention.

 

Many inventors have heard that many if not most patents cost more than they ever earn, and that is true.  But the reason is that most inventions never make it all the way through the commercialization process.

 

Those that do and are successful in the marketplace  can be extremely valuable, such as the RIM patent on its Blackberry phone which was shown to be worth a Billion dollars.

 

There are other questions that are often raised by inventors  such as is a patent necessary when one can go to market without it.

 

While that is true ,without taking the proper non-patent actions someone else may be able to patent the invention out from under you, or you may inadvertently infringe someone elses patent.  Check out this link to my recent presentation on common patent mistakes for details.

 

Checkout AlaCarte Patents to learn more

 

 

 

 

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How is ITTr Different? 

 

 

 

ITTr is not the only patent brokerage around and its useful to compare how we operate to the strategies of our competitors.    ITTr is a direct sales organization.   That is we use our ICF process to carefully target those companies that we feel are most likely to be interested in the patent that is for sale. 

 Other companies use different strategies.  For example, some companies that use what I call the "Craigs List"  model.  They  post long list of patents with some descriptive material on the Internet.  They may couple these lists with search engines of varying effectiveness.  Their hope is that someone will wander by with a need for one of the patents in their inventory and that their search engine will find it and that the buyer will be convinced of its value by reading the patent alone (along with some clever summaries).

Other companies buy the rights to pools of patents.  Often they pay cents on the dollar.  Their hope is to find some real gems in the haystack they purchase.  Those inventors loose out.   Other inventors may get more than they would earn in the open market.

And there are patent auction sites.  If you invention is attractive enough to spark people to compete for it in an auction , you may do well.  Else you may end up selling for much less than you expected. 

Our targeted approach isn't the best one for everyone.  It takes a lot of time and persistence to find the right targets, and the patent owner must help in making the sale by supplying the additional information buyers often want.  We feel however, that our approach is most likely to get the inventor a fair price. 

If you think we might be right for you, contact us at www.ittrifecta.com

 

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Rochester Penguin Group

Reading Your Customers Mind 

The better you understand your customers the more sales you will make.  This is an axiom of marketing.   But how do you do that?  How do you "read your customer's mind".   At Penguin we say that if you want to know what your customer's think "you should ask them".   This is often much easier to say than to do.   Often if you can find the confidence to ask your customers what they think about your business,  you can't figure out quite what to say.   Similarly the customers may be inhibited in responding and tell you what you want to hear , either because they don't want to hurt your feelings  and spoil thier relationship with you or because you don't ask them the right questions or ask them in the right way.   That is why a carefully prepared Voice of the Customer (VOC) calling program can be so much more effective then you can be yourself.   Our Market-Sonar program  works that way.  We can be much more effective than  online or paper questionnaires that often prejudge what the customer thinks and constrains him or her to the questionner's pre-conceived notions.   With Market-Sonar we try to ask open ended questions and invite the customer to tell us what's really on their mind.   That's how we found out that a client's preferred customers base really hated his product.  Because they felt they could do the same job themselves as well or better.   This was not an answer that we or our client had thought of asking.    So, if you want to really know what your customers are thinking give Market-Sonar a try.  Click the link to learn more.
We appreciate your responses to our newsletters.  Please send us your comments.  We are always interested in what you want to know.
 
Sincerely,
 

Richard Blazey
Business Metamorphosis LLC

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