'Education' is key to surviving recession, say IP experts

New ‘State of the Industry’ survey highlights IP professionals’ major concerns and challenges

Findings from an intellectual property industry survey have revealed that IP professionals plan to ‘educate’ their way through the global recession in an attempt to generate a wider awareness of the value of a strong IP portfolio.

The ‘State of the IP Industry Survey 2009’ paints a picture of tighter corporate IP budgets, reduced volumes of IP work for law firms and severe pressure on IP resources, both in legal departments and law firms. The economic downturn is largely to blame with 51.9% of corporate respondents saying the credit crunch is having a detrimental effect on their IP strategies. Law firms expressed an even more pessimistic view, with 67.8% saying that the credit crunch has a negative impact on their clients’ IP strategies and, by association, their own workloads.

The survey was commissioned by CPA Global, the world’s leading provider of IP management services and outsourced legal support services, in association with IP Review magazine.  It represents the views of more than 200 IP professionals around the world.

Results from the survey show that law firms, badly hit by the recession and reduced client spending on IP management - more than half (52%) of the in-house IP professionals surveyed indicated they were reducing spend on outside counsel in 2009 compared with 2008 - see educating clients on the value of their IP assets as critical to safeguarding revenue streams. The immediate need to educate clients on the value and investment potential of IP stood out as a hot topic, with respondents saying this would help ensure clients made ‘rational decisions’ instead of ‘panicked ones’.

In-house IP professionals face similar challenges. The survey highlights the need to educate board-level executives on the value of creating a streamlined patent portfolio rather than accruing a collection of ‘trivial patents’. Corporate IP departments say they are finding themselves under pressure from top management to volume-register IP Rights, without too much thought for their true value.

Despite the economic downturn, the majority of in-house IP professionals are seeing no drop off in the number of IP Rights they are filing.  Some 40% say there has been no change, while another 23% are actually increasing filings as pressure grows to ‘patent everything’.  Only 26% say they plan to reduce the number of filings in 2009.

CPA Global’s Vice President for Patent Portfolio Optimisation, John Pryor, said: “The results of our ‘State of the Industry’ survey have demonstrated a clear need for the IP profession to raise awareness of the value of a healthy IP portfolio. The global recession has shown that law firm clients and corporate boards can often make knee-jerk reactions to safeguard their assets and control costs, but this can be dangerous. Only through a regular and thorough auditing of an IP portfolio can you reveal the true value of an organisation’s IP and provide an informed basis on which to make decisions.  However, many companies do not currently have that discipline when it comes to assessing the value of their IP assets, and don’t always appreciate how proactive IP portfolio management can benefit them.”

Results from the survey show that, while 20% of corporations say they conduct quarterly IP audits, by far the largest proportion (41%) audit only on an annual basis, 10% audit every two years, and 4% say they don’t audit at all.

The ‘State of the IP Industry’ survey was conducted between 27 March 2009 and 8 May 2009.  The breakdown of respondents was 49.3% law firms and 50.7% corporates.  In terms of location, most respondents were from the United Kingdom (36%), North America (28%), and Continental Europe (23%).

Notes to editors
A full analysis report of the ‘State of the Industry’ survey results will be available from Monday 25 May 2009. For a copy of the report, please contact Rob Coveney at CPA Global on +44 (0)1784 224 557 or rcoveney@cpaglobal.com

Further press releases on the 'State of the Industry Survey 2009' results

  IP Survey

  In-house survey

About CPA Global
With clients in over 100 countries, CPA Global is one of the world’s leading providers of legal process outsourcing (LPO) services. Now celebrating its 40th year of operations, CPA Global provides lifecycle management services for intellectual property such as patent, design and trademark searching, watching, renewals, and portfolio strategy.  CPA Global is also a leader in the growing market for outsourced document review, contract management and litigation support services, helping law firms and corporations to realise value by managing risk, cost and capacity. Founded in Jersey, Channel Islands in 1969, CPA Global today employs some 1,200 people in 16 offices in eight countries. For further information visit: www.cpaglobal.com

About IP Review magazine
IP Review is the world's most widely read intellectual property (IP) industry magazine. Delivered directly to more than 15,000 IP professionals, inventors, company directors, legal experts and investors,  IP Review has distinguished itself in its sector by providing lively, readable and challenging copy on a variety of IP issues that champion some of the industry's most insightful thought leadership and current affairs. To find out more, visit www.ipreview.com or email ipreview@cpaglobal.com.

Media Contacts

CPA Global
Steve Clark        +44 (0)1784 224 351, sclark@cpaglobal.com
Rob Coveney     +44 (0)1784 224 557, rcoveney@cpaglobal.com

IP Review magazine
Emma Jones    +44 (0)7786 626 559, emma@thinkpublishing.co.uk