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In increasingly competitive markets, small business owners and founders have to have an edge, and for many, that is their mental property (IP). Often considered your most precious asset, your mental property is your ideas and inventions in a legally documented form.
Your mental property is critical to your founding and growth journey, allowing you to ascertain your organization’s market position, differentiate yourself from other product offerings, and protect yourself. However, today’s global mental property landscape is extremely complex, with over 15 million registered energetic patents and lots of of hundreds of organizations holding these patents.
For the tech-savvy trader, artificial intelligence (AI) means you’ll be able to work smarter, not harder, when it involves sharpening your edge. Leveraging AI as a part of your IP strategy is an effective and cost-effective solution to speed up innovation, streamline processes and proactively manage resources.
IP-specific AI applications are becoming more common nowadays. Buyers have to be discerning and ask themselves, is this tool secure? Is this accurate? Is it profitable? Solutions like Patlytics lead the way in relieving firms of complex administrative work, completing multiple IP workflows in minutes, not months.
Here are five strategies for using AI to deliver significant IP gains for your small business.
1. Accelerate end-to-end patent searches with AI
A prerequisite for the patent application process is to conduct a thorough prior art search. According to the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), almost half all patent applications are rejected for cause state of the art. By confirming the uniqueness of your idea, you increase the probability that your application will probably be positively considered.
To prove uniqueness, you have to search and compare. But try that with 15 million registered patents and you will not finish for years. Traditionally, patent searches are labor-intensive and time-consuming. Artificial intelligence enables deeper, faster and more accurate searches. Powered by machine learning algorithms, AI-powered patent search tools quickly search massive databases to discover relevant patents and highlight potential overlaps or opportunities. For small businesses, this implies a faster path to securing patents and a lower risk of infringement from the start.
2. Get ahead of the competition with artificial intelligence
Always be one step ahead of the competition. This is particularly essential in the mental property sector, where similar products are continually being created. This is also especially difficult to doconsidering there are potentially lots of of thousands and thousands of various products, patents and firms value getting ahead of.
Use artificial intelligence to quickly and repeatedly scan copyright infringing products. Monitor the market diligently with an AI-powered infringement tool to discover potential products that will infringe on your innovation – and due to this fact pose a threat or opportunity – and enable you find the evidence you have to take motion. This intelligence lets you make the right decisions at the right time and effectively protect your assets.
3. Use AI to show patents into profit
Patent licensing offers small businesses the opportunity to monetize their inventions without the costs of production. But it will probably be a guessing game. According to many mental property experts, most patents are worthless – perhaps greater than 95% are never reimbursed for the costs incurred in filing them. How do you know what big bets to make in comparison with your competitors’ products, the market landscape, and your personal patent strengths?
Artificial intelligence introduces much-needed precision by eliminating the guesswork associated with complex comparative decisions. It allows small businesses to pinpoint their most precious assets and make informed decisions based on competitive products, the market landscape, and their very own MVP.
4. Build a strong and diversified portfolio with AI
Consider a portfolio strategy of building strong patents around key innovations. Having many related patents can create a patent thicket, making it difficult for competitors to challenge or circumvent your mental property. Also consider your diversification strategy. Diversifying your patent portfolio can protect against industry changes and technological advances. Having patents in various sectors provides multiple sources of revenue and the ability to efficiently adapt to market changes.
Both portfolio strategies assume a basic understanding of your current portfolio. This could appear easy (shouldn’t all of us know our own patents?), but when scaled to lots of or hundreds of patents, how are you going to get essential intelligence points resembling invention sector, jurisdiction, value or expiration at a glance? An AI classification tool can mechanically flag your assets and select which patents to take motion on.
5. Simplify the project creation process with AI support
Proper documentation is key here. Preparing detailed notes, sketches and descriptions of how the invention works and its uniqueness is required for a patent application and also serves as evidence if legal problems arise. However, collecting all the information from the various groups and compiling it will probably be tedious and often takes over a 12 months. This is the 12 months when your idea is not yet fully protected, enforced or monetized. Use an AI-powered patent drafting tool to find and capture your inventions faster, reducing the time from idea to filing and making the journey from idea to patent approval much easier.
The stakes and constraints of IP challenges force small business owners and founders to adopt smart, efficient methods to maximise successful IP outcomes. Now, by leveraging recent AI for IP tools, they will secure their place in the market higher and faster than ever before. Your IP is the engine of innovation and business development. We hope these strategies and tools help speed up your success.