When your company wants to apply for several patents, which one do you focus on? Which one deserves your time and money? Which one comes first? If your company is growing fast, you may have several inventions to protect, and they can all seem equally important. Even so, I’d advise you to take a hard look at your portfolio and sort it into three categories: leaders, sprinters and the peloton. This filter helps you plan your applications more strategically.
A start-up often has only one or two patent applications. They’re the company’s main assets, so the owners know every detail. But when a start-up grows into a scale-up or an established business, the portfolio usually grows too. If you then treat every application as if it were your only one, you risk wasting time and money. Sorting your applications into leaders, sprinters and the peloton helps you avoid this.
Leaders
Leaders are the applications that cover the core of your technology. You wouldn’t license these out, because they protect the heart of your business. You fight to get them granted as broadly as possible. You pull out all the stops. They also get the biggest share of the budget. If someone infringes a leader, you go to great lengths to defend it.
Here’s an example from early in my career. A client came to me with a clever idea. She wanted to paint a wall at home, so she cycled to the DIY shop for supplies. Paint, rollers, masking tape, brushes for the edges. The lot! Or so she thought. When she got home, she realised she had forgotten a paint tray to pour the paint into and dip her roller in.
That gave her an idea. She developed a paint tin with a lid that works as a built-in paint tray, complete with ridges to run your brush along. No more pouring paint into a tray, rinsing it out or scraping off dried paint. Her core idea, a paint tin with a built-in tray, is the leader.
Sprinter
A sprinter adds to the leader. Your patent attorney drafts it narrowly and precisely. With a sprinter, you don’t chase the broadest possible protection. You go straight for what you need. It’s a patent you want, but one you could license out without putting the core of your business at risk. A sprinter gets less time and money than a leader, but is still worth a targeted application.
In the paint tin example, the seal on the lid is a sprinter. The seal stops the tin leaking and keeps the paint from drying out. But it isn’t the actual invention. It improves one detail of the core innovation.
The peloton
The peloton holds good ideas you may or may not develop. They’re nice to have, but not essential to your core technology. If they’re granted, you’re happy to license them out. And if you turn out to be infringing another patent, a peloton patent gives you something to trade in a cross-licence deal. If the application runs into trouble, you can let it lapse and stop spending on it.
For the paint tin, a peloton application might cover the material of the handle. A patent would help, but it sits apart from the big idea.
Filter
I challenge you to apply this filter to your own portfolio. Which technology is core to your business, which complements it and which sits furthest from the original idea?
Keep in mind that during the application process, you can move an application from leader to sprinter, but not the other way round. Once you file an application, you’re bound by what’s in it. You can’t broaden the patent later. You can always take a step back, but never a step up.
Your ‘team’ of patents and applications doesn’t need to be all leaders. A mix lets you protect your ideas without overspending.
Want to work out whether your innovations are leaders, sprinters or part of the peloton? Get in touch.
