5 key steps for intellectual property management for SME

In times of economic crisis the things that can differentiate one company could be critical for its market success.

Some parts of this differentiation can be based on intellectual property rights such as trademarks, patents, industrial designs, copyrights, domain names etc.

One important moment in that regard is how these rights are managed in order to provide the company owner with the necessary economic benefits.

This is essential because in the case of poor management the consequences for the market position of the company could be quite negative.

All big companies have organisations and policies on how to deal with the management of their intellectual property portfolios.

In the case of small and mid-size companies this is not possible all the time because it requires human and financial resources.

Nevertheless there are some things that can be done which will help SME do preserve the value of their intellectual property:

1. Make an audit of everything that can represent the intellectual property in the company – the main goal is to discover what the company has. For example some products can be sold under a brand name which is not protected as a trademark. Another example is for key technology that is not protected by a patent or trade secret.
2. Evaluate the information from the audit and identify the key value of intellectual property within the company.
3. Proceed with receiving the necessary protection for those of the assets that can be registered with the Patent Office as trademarks, industrial designs, patents etc.
4. Create a database for your intellectual property portfolio in order to manage it properly and to keep yourself on date with its status.
5. Go over the portfolio and identify the possibilities for licensing your intellectual property to other companies. This can be an additional revenue stream for your company.

In case you are a small business and you want to build a database of intellectual property, you can learn how to do that almost for free through this Udemy course: A complete guide on how to build an IP database using Asana