In-House vs. Outsourced Intellectual Property Services: How to choose

INTRODUCTION

Many small and medium-sized businesses have a small (if any) legal department, and it is very usual for IP prosecution to be outsourced to external lawyers who have the time and experience to manage such matters properly – the filing of patent applications, renewals, and other IP related legal tasks.

The lawyers, IP executives, and/or other decision-makers in the organization need to know exactly what is in their portfolio, what steps have been taken historically, and how they are positioned for the future in order to make smart business decisions and align one's IP strategy with the rest of the organization's goals. Given the heavy financial expenditure needed by patenting and other types of intellectual asset management, this type of knowledge should not be held at arm's length, but should, irrespective of its scale, be readily available and highly visible within an organization.

Each alternative has benefits and disadvantages. In order for you to make an educated decision, we would like to get you on a road to better understand what goes into both. Read on as we discuss what you need to know about what they are, how they are different, and how to decide what is best for your company about in-house vs. outsourced intellectual property services.

The advantages and drawbacks of outsourcing and in-house growth can help clear things out and encourage you to make a decision. So let's start on in-house vs. outsourced intellectual property services:

Advantages of in-house and outsourced intellectual property services -

Disadvantages of in-house and outsourced intellectual property services-

So now that we have read through the advantages and disadvantages of outsourcing as well as in-house growth, which method of growth should you adopt? Should it be an in-house or outsourced intellectual property service?

To remain competitive, you need to get the best out of both worlds. When expert support is needed in any particular technology or project domain, get an in-house team for your core.

So, why not to opt for outsourced Intellectual Property Services:

For many companies, a variety of factors can influence the decision to manage their intellectual property portfolio internally or externally

• Size of Business

• Organization Type

• Portfolio of Products

• Number of Market Competitors

• Number of available resources

• Potential and future Portfolio Growth

Why opt for In-house Services?

1. Usually small and early-stage companies with a restricted portfolio of intellectual property and internal legal services are capable of managing the related administrative work. As such, if you have a small budget to work with, handling your portfolio internally during the early stages of your company may be more cost-effective. However, the value of intellectual property to the security of your company should not be overlooked, particularly as a small business.

2. Maintaining a strong portfolio of intellectual property involves significant cross-team coordination and cooperation in order to capture and share all relevant data among stakeholders. In a lean company of tiny, internal teams, this method is generally easier to manage.

3. In larger companies, recruiting and handling intellectual property experts internally can be expensive, but beneficial, as their primary emphasis is on the company and strategy. This way, as insiders with in-depth knowledge of the company and its course, they will provide valuable insights.

4. Maintaining your intellectual property resources internally for security purposes can be beneficial depending on your sector. In order to prevent it from being compromised by data breaches, businesses with trade secrets will sometimes introduce high standards of protection over their intellectual property. This is typically in situations where all confidential information must remain on-site; or it is prohibitive to determine the time, money, or expense of external vendors' protection.

5. You may already have an abundance of highly qualified and knowledgeable intellectual property experts within your organization, as well as access to the appropriate tools and services if your company deals primarily with the legal field. As such, exploiting internal resources can be more cost-effective.

But most of the time an outsourced intellectual property service works the best for the businesses. So why you should opt for outsourced intellectual property services?

Your company forgoes the chance to get an external perspective on handling your portfolio policy by keeping your intellectual property portfolio management internally. Although having internal intellectual property experts who are close to the company is fantastic, the expertise and experience of an external professional help to establish a good plan for intellectual property. For any business, building a smart portfolio is the best advantage.

1. Intellectual property services providers have more expertise

It's important to bring as much expertise and experience to the process as possible when designing and managing your intellectual property portfolio strategy. For several businesses in a wide range of industries, IP providers consult, create, and manage IP strategies, each with their own specific set of requirements.

2. Saving valuable resources

From an early stage, an intellectual property services supplier will help you optimize the business benefits of your IP properties. By ensuring your intellectual property assets continually add value to your business strategy, they increase the lifetime value of your portfolio. In the meantime, the internal resources of your company are unburdened by the continuing challenging requirements of portfolio management.

3. Expanding the horizons

Through partnering with your team to capture all potential assets in your portfolio and make sure they are used efficiently, an intellectual property services company enhances your portfolio strategy. This could include strategic assets that your company does not use, preventing a rival from gaining a foothold in the industry. As such for optimal success and profitability, the market plan and intellectual property portfolio would be consistently aligned.

4. The lack in the Internal Sources

Developing a portfolio of intellectual property involves a specific mix of expertise, networks, and capital, and in-house creation may be excessively costly. Thus several corporations look to providers of intellectual property services to access valuable tools in a cost-effective manner.

CONCLUSION

With a genuinely full-service supplier of intellectual property services, you have a single point of contact that can handle partnerships in all aspects of the job, ensuring you don't have to waste valuable resources. You should have maximum cost transparency, as well. The external service provider can work with a large customer network, and it is likely that a full-service option is less costly than doing things in-house. Because of this you will benefit from such economies of scale and be able to benefit from your provider's existing institutional knowledge.

BY-

Ankita Rathi