Imagine a situation where you are collating a patent portfolio for monetization or there’s a plan to acquire patents. This is like investing in gold or platinum, sort of a difficult call, isn’t it?  Before putting huge efforts into portfolio formation, you would like to get positive indications on the patents so that you can proceed further.

It’s common for patent owners, investors, and litigation lawyers to get into a situation where they are running out of time. They want to avert spending too much time in the beginning. Nonetheless, at such a time they want a quick hint of the quality of a patent or a patent set.

This is absolutely fine as the majority of us take a decision this way. In general, nobody wants to spend huge efforts to get unexpected results in the end. As a result, people spend effort on steps. And if they see hints of a fruitful outcome, the efforts increase. Like every other industry, the same is applicable in the IP industry as well.

Keeping the above thought in mind and to save time and money of patent lawyers, investors, and patent owners, we developed a tool, i.e. Patent Ranking Engine. To give an analogy, it could be related to a Judge that analyzes all the parameters linked with a patent before giving the final judgment.

The rank assigns to a patent gives you an idea about its quality and helps you make more informed decisions. The Patent ranking engine of GreyB assists you in:

Competitive analysis –  It helps you in competitive patent landscape analysis where you can get hints about the quality of the competitor’s IP.

Litigations – Needless to say, it is an excellent aid when it comes to getting a hint for litigation. One can get a consolidated hint on the strength of a patent and can decide on the further course of action.

Portfolio Monetization – Helps you find the good patents that are present in your huge portfolio.

Acquisition – Helps you in a patent acquisition by selecting the best patents that you can acquire.

Why not put it to test over a case-

There was a litigation case in 2011 between Centocor Ortho Biotech Inc., and New York University, (Plaintiffs-Appellees) VS Abbott Laboratories, Abbott Bioresearch Center, inc., And Abbott Biotechnology Ltd., (Defendants-Appellants).

To brief about the case, Plaintiff sued Defendant for infringing claims 2, 3, 14 & 15 on their patent US7070775. During the trial proceeding, the court got convenience to the claim and found the defendant liable for willful infringement. The defendant was penalized with a whopping amount of $1.67 billion. With such ongoing proceedings, the defendant decided to challenge the validity of the patent (US7070775) as the only resort to be saved. The effort of the defendant completely flourished as he was able to find a loophole in the patent which in turn invalidated the claim.

Now, what would have been the outlook, if Assignee had hints about the invalidity of the patent?

From the above ranking status (lower the rank strong the patent), it is evident that a detailed analysis and assurance on various facets of the patent was required. The data above and the areas of focus might have changed the face of the case. If the patent would have been among the top 25% patents here, it would have been assumed to be a strong patent. Though this isn’t going to change history; however, one thing is clear that having such information at your disposal helps you make careful decisions.

Further, I won’t be surprised if you ask me whether the Patent Ranking Engine is also applicable in portfolio benchmarking. Well, yes, it is. It suggests the quality of a patent in comparison to other patents of the same domain. It is that good.

CMO’s Note: We have some great news too. For a limited period of time, we are letting you try your hands on our Patent Ranking Engine. Click here – GreyB’s Patent Ranking Engine.

 Authored By – Shikhar Sahni, SVP, Operations, and Abhishek Bhati, Team Lead, Concept Hacking.

Related Tool: GreyFox – A Tool That Helps Sell Or License Undervalued Patents