IP economic evaluation

IP economic evaluation

Patent and Trademark Valuations

Our firm has built a solid relationship with experienced professionals specialising in economic valuation of intellectual property assets and portfolios, based on the clients’ necessities and scope-driven requirements. Our highly qualified professionals have solid plurennial experience in IP portfolio evaluation and are purpose driven to obtain bank or private institution funding, compensation from counterfeiters or to negotiate agreements with potential technical / commercial partners.

As an example, you can download a PDF (in Italian) that illustrates some methods normally used to compute economic values of intellectual property assets.

Economic evaluation of the Intellectual Property Assets in Italy

Companies list their IP assets among “intangible assets” within their accounting statements. These assets should be recorded according to their ” estimated financial value” of the company’s IP portfolio. The portfolio of patents, trademarks and designs allows a company to negotiate licenses, to transfer technology or technical and commercial partnerships and to negotiate loans with banks.

An IP portfolio turns to be an appropriate “currency” when a company negotiates:

  • licensing agreements;
  • agreements on the transfer of Intellectual Property rights;
  • franchising, merchandising, co-branding and distribution agreements;
  • agreements on technical joined development of new products / processes;
  • loans.

Today, most SMEs consider industrial property primarily as a cost, therefore, they prefer to avoid extra expenses that sometimes results in avoiding to protect their assets at all. Instead, industrial property may play a strategic role, and may allow to acquire competitive advantages and tackle the market.

The Italian banking system is trying to take example from foreign experiences, in order to frame industrial property as an incentive for innovation, especially in the financial field. From the end of 2008, the Italian Patent and Trademark Office (UIBM), the main association of manufacturing and service companies Confindustria, Universities (CRUI) and the Italian Banking Association ABI have started a round table to develop a shared strategy for the economic and financial evaluation of the patent, trademark and design portfolio of companies.

The work done by this group helped the Ministry of Productive Activities to establish the criteria of economic incentives identified in the program 'Industria 2015', whose aim is to support enterprises - especially of medium and small size SMEs - in the development of projects protected by trademarks, patents and designs. The tenders PATENTS+, DESIGN+ and TRADEMARKS+ set up in 2011 by the Ministry and by the new FUND FOR INNOVATION, are the result of this new program.

The banks of the ABI will use the above-mentioned strategy to define in detail the funding criteria of companies having an IP portfolio.

For universities, it is a new opportunity to maximise profits arising from the transfer of technology and innovation, conceived within the University.

There is still much to do in order to spread the conviction that protecting IP assets, enhancing IP rights and attributing to IP assets the proper economic value, are the milestones of many successful businesses and should not be seen as a bare cost, but as an investment.