Insights from IP Intelligence at Different Stages of the Product Innovation Lifecycle
The innovation lifecycle involves various stages of the innovation process, optimal conditions, and the appropriate time to utilize IP research and intelligence methods. This blog post highlights the process from a patent intelligence perspective and the professionals that are invaluable at every stage. Refer to the figure below to understand each stage of the product innovation lifecycle:
- Ideation
This stage primarily involves generating new ideas which are then filtered based on a prior art search for patentability. Simply put, you need to ensure that the idea is novel, non-obvious and industrially applicable before proceeding to the next step, patent landscape analysis. For this evaluation, you must carry out a patent landscape analysis wherein you study the technology area such as its patent and assignee trends to gain insights on current technologies. Subsequently, you can conduct a white space analysis to validate promising technology areas with the help of patent attorneys, patent search specialists, subject-matter experts and researchers, to ensure you are not proceeding with the wrong idea.
2. R&D
During the R&D phase, you should align your ideas with company objectives by consulting competitive intelligence professionals, patent search specialists and academic researchers. Additionally, you must undertake a competitor analysis to pin-point the experts in the field so that you can benchmark your portfolio against your peers.
- Applied R&D
After the basic R&D stage, you should start the patent filing process to protect your idea by consulting patent agents and IP attorneys. It is crucial to have appropriate legal protection for your intellectual property so that your company can flourish in a volatile and competitive business climate. You also need to check if your patent might be infringing someone else’s by doing an infringement analysis. This will guarantee that the product doesn’t infringe anyone else’s patent after its launch.
3. Market Development
At this stage, a FTO (Freedom to Operate) search is carried out to determine if testing or commercializing the product is possible without infringing existing intellectual property rights or not.
Learn more: Benefits of IP intelligence in the product launch and maturity stages of the innovation lifecycle.
