Innovation and IP management

Target audience

Innovation is the key to success for European businesses, as they strive to stay ahead of the competition. All too often, however, the role that patents play in supporting innovation is unknown.

The Innovation Support unit informs industry and policy-makers about how to make the most of the intellectual property system. The unit's training is ultimately directed at businesses, especially new, small or medium-sized enterprises. In the first instance, seminars and workshops are provided for those who advise and support such companies. These intermediaries multiply messages about good patent strategies to an ever-increasing audience of managers, designers, engineers and scientists.

The programmes offered by the Innovation Support unit extend beyond private consultancies and state-funded business advice services. The audience for the unit's training services includes all the potential sources of advice to which a business might turn: for example, chambers of commerce, patent information centres, licence brokers, lawyers and financial service providers.

Getting the message across

The national patent offices across Europe are ideally placed to work with the existing business advice networks, such as the Business Innovation Centres and the over 600 members of the Enterprise Europe Network. Consequently the unit is pleased to work in partnerships both with such networks and with national patent offices in reaching its target audience. The unit can provide expert speakers on a wide variety of patent-related topics, such as patent information, patent portfolio management, IP valuation, licensing, dispute resolution, enforcement and technology transfer.

The Innovation Support unit's material can now be accessed on demand through the Academy's website, enabling users to draw from a growing knowledge resource at a time and pace which suits their other working commitments.

In addition to online training material, the unit also provides the Inventors' Handbook - a practical guide to bringing an invention to the marketplace. Making money from an invention involves much more than just filing a patent application. Research must be done, partnerships made, traps avoided, finance raised, and a business built up. This step-by-step guide explains how to successfully manage the commercialisation process.

How the Academy makes a difference

The Innovation Support unit learns about the best practices offered by its partners, the national patent offices, and then promotes the sharing of this know-how with other national offices.

The various workshops and seminars organised by the unit for audiences of business advisors in the member states make use of the EPO's expertise in patent information and patent commercialisation topics.

The Innovation Support unit has gathered and collated the best IP training materials to be found anywhere in Europe. This resource can be used to train IP trainers, who in turn can promote messages about patent strategies and good IP practice to business advisors, SMEs and businesses throughout the member states. The materials are provided through the ip4inno website.