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Innovation and Intellectual Property Management (IIPM) Laboratory

Building stronger intellectual property strategy capabilities

Supporting SMEs to suceed with open innovation

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are considered to be the engine of the European economy. They are expected to lead the ‘twin transitions’ towards climate neutrality and digital leadership set out in the European Commission’s (The Commission) industrial strategy. It is generally accepted that they will play an important role in the recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. While SMEs are a heterogeneous group of businesses, many SMEs pioneer new technologies, products, services and software. As those solutions become increasingly technologically complex, SMEs more frequently engage in collaborations with a wide range of partners, i.e. Open Innovation (OI). After an official commitment to OI in 2016, the Commission continues to promote OI as part of its digital single market and innovation policies. Not only for SMEs working on key enabling technologies, their Hard-IP (e.g. patents, trademarks), but often more so their Soft-IP (e.g. data, know-how), represents a considerable value to their business. However, a large share of SMEs still lacks awareness and understanding of IP, not least to effectively appropriate the benefits of OI. This study was commissioned to provide an empirical basis for existing OI models and the extent to which IP – including patents, utility models, designs, but also trade secrets, data and know-how – facilitates or hinders OI, with a particular focus on SMEs.

 

Additive manufacturing innovationsAdditive Manufacturing Innovations by UK Organisations

A review of patents and literature published between 2006 and 2015
Jane List and Frank Tietze

 

Future patent analyticsExploring The Future Of Patent Analytics

Leonidas Aristodemou and Frank Tietze

 

News & Blog articles

Patent Olympiad at IPOS IP Week in Singapore

9 October 2024

Dr Nigel Clarke, Visiting Fellow to the IIPM Lab is co-founder of the Patent Olympiad, which recently took place in Singapore at the IPOS IP Week. He has provided a short article below. powinners2024.jpeg Image by N. Clarke. Nigel is all the way to the right. By Nigel Clarke. (C) 2024 Patent searching is a profession...

New EC Bulletin: Prof. Tietze reflects on the EC POINT project

8 October 2024

In the recently published European IP Helpdesk Bulletin Prof. Tietze reflects on what has happened to the capabilities of SMEs to manage IP in open innovation projects following the publication of the EC POINT report in 2021. The Bulletin is available here: https://op.europa.eu/en/publication-detail/-/publication/ee45fb15-...

Farewell to Alexander Viets and David Gross

2 October 2024

We are saying good-bye to two of our IIPM visitors. Alexander Viets was a visiting PhD student from the University of Muenster. David Gross visited us to complete his master thesis as part of his programme at the RWTH Aachen. We look forward to continue our collaborations on joint papers and wish you all the best for your...