Stakeholders across the IP community are keen to increase diversity in their ranks but, as Suzanne Harrison and Erik Oliver explain, even the most sophisticated companies face a challenge in building a full picture of precisely who is participating in the patenting process.

Intellectual property licensing continues to grow increasingly complex with the legal, regulatory and technical landscape constantly evolving. Building and maintaining a successful and effective practice requires that practitioners stay sharp and current in a wide variety of key areas. Whether you are using licensing to develop technology, expand or create market opportunities, develop technology, or generate returns from existing assets, managing licensing transactions requires a broad and deep toolkit.

After 10 years analysing the patent market, we have some very direct advice this year. If you are in-house counsel, to borrow a line from Samuel L Jackson: “Hold onto your butts.” These next few years are going to be tough.

The confusion around how to answer when someone asks the going rate for a patent in part stems from the common use of “price” and “value”nearly interchangeably in day-to-day conversations.

The current issue of IAM carries the latest annual survey on the brokered patent deals market from the team at Richardson Oliver Insights.

Since average price per patent was the “worst thing that has ever happened to patents”, we are pleased to introduce the new worst thing ever.

Yesterday the United States Supreme Court issued decisions in both Oil States v. Green Energy and SAS Institute v. Iancu. In Oil States the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of inter partes review (see here, here and here). In SAS Institute, a 5-4 majority ruled that there is no authorization in the statute for the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) to partially institute a petition for inter partes review. Thus, the Supreme Court held that when the Patent Office institutes an inter partes review it must decide the patentability of all of the claims the petitioner has challenged.

Earlier today the United States Supreme Court issued its decision in Oil States v. Green Energy, finding that inter partes review is constitutional both under Article III and the Seventh Amendment to the United States Constitution. In a 7-2 decision, the Court determined that patents are a government franchise that are subject to review by the Patent Office even after granting, and can be revoked at any time.

We explore how you can model the expected cost and revenue of your ongoing cross-licensing negotiations to make it easier to prioritize your activities, and how doing that helps you run your cross-licensing program like a business.

Determining whether a patent is a "good" asset can be tricky. With a patent's value typically being realized almost ten years after its grant, how can we know the value of any newly-granted patent?