Keynote speech: The Evolving IP Marketplace: Established and Emerging Business Models for Extracting Value from Patents Ronald S. Laurie, Chairman, Inflexion Point Group

Abstract

Over the past eight years or so, intellectual property, and patents in particular, have come to be recognized by technology companies and by the financial community not just as a bundle of legal rights to be enforced or licensed, but as an independent commercial asset class, like real estate and corporate securities. Innovative new models for trading and monetizing patents have emerged based on the creative adaptation of existing models used with more traditional asset classes. This change in perception about the utility, and thus the value, of patents has spawned a proliferation of market makers, intermediaries and service providers including aggregators, enforcers, investors, analysts, financiers, brokers, exchanges, and auction houses, and new business models are constantly emerging. This presentation will provide an overview of this dynamic ecosystem and some predictions as to where it is going.

Speaker Biography

Ron Laurie is the Managing Director of Inflexion Point Strategy, LLC, the first intellectual property investment bank, which he co-founded in 2004. Inflexion Point represents technology companies and financial investors in bringing the unrealized value of high-quality IP assets to the bottom line by increasing corporate valuation in M&A transactions, by building a defensive patent shield against litigious competitors and by generating additional top-line revenue via creative exclusive field-of-use licensing programs. Ron is also a principal in Percipience, LLC, a board-level advisory firm focused on IP strategy, competitive intelligence, focused innovation and patent valuation. Ron has worked in Silicon Valley since before it had that name, initially as a software engineer and then as an IP lawyer focusing on IP strategy, a subject he has taught at Stanford and Boalt law schools. Ron was a founding partner of the Silicon Valley offices of Skadden Arps, Weil Gotshal, and Irell & Manella. The focus of Ron's prior legal practice was on the strategic use of IP assets in complex business transactions such as mergers and acquisitions, technology spin-outs, joint ventures, and strategic alliances, and he led IP teams in some of the largest technology deals ever done, worth over $50 billion in the aggregate. Ron is a registered patent attorney and has authored a number of landmark patents including the Priceline "reverse-auction" patent which was the first Internet business method patent to attract national attention.