Developing intellectual property can consume decades of painstaking work and cost many millions of dollars. At some point, inventors (and their sponsors) will want to achieve a return on their lives’ work.
Yet, you can’t manage what you can’t measure. And you can’t monetize what you can’t value.
The consequences of not knowing the value of your intellectual property are many. At the negotiating table, licensing professionals will misprice upfront payments, milestones and royalty rates. On term sheets and during roadshows, company valuations will dismiss the contribution of firms’ most critical assets.
Limiting one’s review to accounting ledgers will present a warped perspective of the value of patents and inventions. In the context of acquisitions, joint-ventures or corporate reorganizations, ignoring the valuation of intangible assets is the precursor to massively miscalculating closing prices, deal terms and equity allocation.
Those who cannot articulate the value of their intellectual property are condemned to accept whatever price their negotiating adversaries are willing to pay. Inventors and shareholders truly pay the price for ill-prepared negotiators.
Never put your organization at the mercy of better prepared negotiators. Don’t miss this unique primer on Maximizing the Value of Your Firm’s Intellectual Property.
David Wanetick developed, manages and is the lead instructor for the Certified Patent Valuation Analyst designation. The CPVA designation is the undisputed world leader in teaching the patent community the metrics and methodologies for valuing patents. CPVA training programs have been run more than 150 times all over the world—and as far away as Thailand, the Philippines, Dubai, Israel, India, China, Hong Kong and Malaysia. More than one thousand successful patent professionals have earned the CPVA designation. CPVA designees hail from some of the world’s largest companies and most reputable law firms as well as prestigious universities and national laboratories.
David Wanetick, Chief Executive Officer, IncreMental Advantage, LLC
IncreMental Advantage is a valuation firm with an expertise in valuing intangible assets such as patents, trademarks, trade secrets and copyrights as well as emerging technologies. IncreMental Advantage is based in Chandler, AZ.
David prepares Company and Patent Valuation Reports that are used to facilitate transactions such as capital raises, sales of companies, sales of patent portfolios and licensing agreements. His reports are instrumental in pricing transactions worth tens, or even hundreds of millions, of dollars. David’s clients include Fortune 500 companies, emerging companies, private equity and venture capital funds, universities and government agencies.
David is also a Managing Director at Merit Investment Bank, a boutique investment bank with an expertise in selling middle market companies in a wide array of industries to operating companies, family offices and to private equity funds and their portfolio companies. Merit is also active in effecting capital raises at the B round and beyond.
David is the author of seven books that have achieved world-wide acclaim, including the only two books that unveil Industry Analysis. He has been a guest on CNBC, Bloomberg and CNNfn and has been quoted in the Wall Street Journal, Barrons, Investor’s Business Daily, Boards & Directors, and many other newspapers, blogs and magazines throughout the United States. His articles on Valuing Patents and Early-Stage Technologies and Negotiating Licensing Agreements have been published in Intellectual Asset Management, IPWatchdog, CEO Magazine, Licensing Journal, Willamette Insights, Valuation Strategies, IP Frontline, Technology Transfer Tactics, Inventor’s Digest, The Canadian Institute of Chartered Business Valuators, among others.