NIPC Inventors Club

Straight from the Horse's Mouth:"Filing a UK patent application - process and procedures"

2012-01-31T10:27:00.001Z

When you apply for a British patent you have to satisfy the Intellectual Property Office that your invention is new, involves an inventive step, is capable of industrial application, does not fall within any of the statutory exclusions and meets all the other requirements of the Patents Act 1977. The official who considers your application is called an examiner. The photo shows a group of them to the left. Very brainy people as you can imagine. Albert Einstein once did that job for the Swiss federal intellectual property office.

It's not often that you actually get a chance to meet a patent examiner but this opportunity will arise on Monday 6 Feb 2012 in Sheffield and Wednesday 15 Feb 2012 in Leeds.

Sheffield and Leeds inventors groups are delighted to welcome Kalim Yasseen, an examiner of the UK Intellectual Property Office to our February meetings. Kalim will talk about "Filing a UK patent application - process and procedures".

These talks are important not just for inventors but also for patent agents, entrepreneurs, business advisers, bankers, angels and venture capital investors and just about everyone involved in the patenting process.

The Sheffield talk will take place at Sheffield Central Library, Surrey Street, Sheffield, S1 1XZ on 6 Feb at 18:00.

The Leeds talk will take place at Leeds Central Library, Calverley Street, Leeds, LS1 3AB on 15 Feb at 18:00.

Both events are free.

Liverpool Inventors Club Re-launch - Fabulous FabLab

2012-01-28T13:03:00.002Z

As everyone in Liverpool knows, Liverpool Central Library at William George Street has been closed for refurbishment since 23 July 2010. According to patent librarian Ruth Grodner, it is not due to re-open to the public until some time in 2013.

The library hosted Liverpool Inventors Club and th:e CIPA patent clinic. Since the refurbishment, both have been looking for a new home. Now thanks to QualitySolicitors Jackson & Canter, we have found a new one for the Inventors Club and the patent and trade mark agents and other IP practitioners in IP North West will provide a patent clinic service for Liverpool until the CIPA one is up and running again.

The Inventors Club will kick off to a fantastic start with a presentation by Haydn Insley of the Manufacturing Institute who runs the fabulous FabLab Manchester. The meeting will take place on Monday, 27 Feb 2012 at 18:00 at the offices of QualitySolicitors Jackson & Canter at
88 Church Street
Liverpool
L1 3AY

This is an event for everyone in Merseyside, not just inventors but artists, business angels, designers, patent and trade mark agents and other IP professionals, venture capitalists. The lot.

Space is limited so book your ticket quickly. Click here to register for the event or contact your host Michael Sandys at 0151 282 1700 for further info on the event.

Further Information on FabLabs

IP North West
FabLab Manchester, Introduction to Intellectual Property
The Manchester FabLab
FabLab Manchester

Inventors Club
Jane Keats "Factories of the Future"

IP Yorkshire
FabLabs for Yorkshire: IntegreatPlus Learning Lunch

FabLabs for Yorkshire: Progress Report

A FabLab for Keighley

FabLab Manchester

FabLab Manchester website

Linkedin Group (invitation only)

Miscellaneous Links

Neil Gerchelfeld's presentation on TED

Neil Gerschenfeld's home page

Center for Bits and Atoms at MIT

BIPC Newcastle

2012-01-21T14:44:00.001Z

On 26 Oct 2010 I blogged an announcement by Mark Preece MP of a new a new collaboration between the British Library, NESTA, Newcastle City Library and Northumbria University for a new Business and IP Centre in Newcastle along the lines of the British Library's Business and IP Centre in London (see Jane Lambert "Resources for Inventors in North East England"). I am pleased to say that the Centre is now open at Newcastle City Library and it has a website and twitter feed.

The home page of the website claims to be the "only dedicated Business and Intellectual Property Centre outside London". Leeds Business and Patents would be entitled to argue with that. Like Leeds, the BIPC sets out to be "a comprehensive one-stop-shop for the region’s business talent, offering everything from research materials to subscription database access; tailored 1:1 consultation sessions to the latest business journals."

The BIPC's resources include:

A wide selection of business reference and lending books.
Free factsheets and guides (including Trade Marks, Design, Copyright, Esp@cenet, Historical Patents Searching, Patent Information and IP protection)
Current and backdated newspapers and journals including Management Today, Investors Chronicle, Trade International, Moneyfacts, Marketing, People Management and Contrax Weekly.
A dedicated seating/study/networking area for business use.
Display cabinets exhibiting successful case studies and historical patents journals.
2 x Apple Macs and 1 PC dedicated for business use.
Business database subscriptions including Keynote, Cobra, Corporate Researcher and Which?
A private interview room with PC/internet access.
Interactive ‘Skills Swap’ networking board.

Resources available in the wider library include a 100 seat café with terrace area, printing, photocopying, scanning and faxing facilities and free internet and Wi-Fi. All good stuff.

The enterprise is a joint venture between the City and British Libraries, Newcastle Science City, Northumbria University, the Bdaily business network, some local solicitors and the Newcastle branch of a firm of patent and trade mark agents. Advertised services include assistance with business planning, patent, trade mark and design searches and skill training. BIPC has an interesting programme of events starting with business coaching and a talk by Trevor Baylis on 24 Jan 2012. It plans to develop a range of services on the London model.

One thing that they do seem to lack in Newcastle is an inventors group like the ones in Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester and Sheffield. When I published my article in 2010 I received a number of enquires and offers of help from inventors in the North East. Our chambers would be very glad to help set up such a group in Newcastle if anyone would care to contact us on 0191 580 8090 or through our form.

The Library is open until 20:30 on Monday to Thursday. It shuts at 17:30 on Friday and Saturday and 17:00 on Sunday. Its address is 33 New Bridge St West, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 8AX.

Ideas North West: Going for Grants

2012-01-17T12:14:00.002Z

If you missed Charles Lucas and Tom Bathgate of Going for Grants when they spoke in Yorkshire you can catch Charles in Accrington on Thursday.

He will be speaking to Ideas North West at

The Globe Centre
St.James Square
Accrington
Lancashire
BB5 0RE
Thursday, 19 Jan 2012 at 18:00 for 18:30.

Further information from Margaret Tate on 01254 208419.

Leeds Inventors Club: John Biddleston

2012-01-08T13:27:00.003Z

Leeds Inventors Group is in for a treat this month. The first speaker of the New Year will be John Biddleston who gave an excellent talk to the Sheffield Inventors Group on 7 Nov 2011.

The title of John's talk will be "The Importance of Planning". He is well qualified for that topic as he us a product design consultant as well as an inventor. He is also a qualified teacher and knows how to keep an audience's attention. I wish he had been one of my masters.

The talk will take place on 18 Jan 2012 at 18:00 at Central Library, Calverley Street, Leeds, LS1 3AB. For further information call Ged Doonan or Stef Stephenson on 0113 247 8266 or email piu@leeds.gov.uk.

Happy New Year - this could be the year the recovery starts

2012-01-01T10:22:00.007Z

Last year a group of economists predicted a modest recovery for the British economy. Many of the economic indicators suggested that they might be right. Manufacturing was powering ahead and exporters were doing well. However, I thought they were over optimistic and said so many times in my twitter stream. Several people including one of my best friends accused me of talking down the economy but I am sorry to say that events proved me right.

This year, economists are predicting gloom and doom and again many of the indicators are suggesting that they may be right. Again, I take a different view. I think the pessimism is exaggerated. I believe that 2012 will be the year in which we see signs of recovery.

Why do I say that? The answer is that the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) and CIVETS (Columbia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Egypt, Turkey and South Africa) countries as well as other emerging economies are growing so quickly internally that they can lift the world from recession. That was the outcome that I envisaged at the start of the downturn (see The Coming Economic Downturn: How it will affect inventors and what they can do).

I am not alone in anticipating recovery. Neil Mackay, managing director of Advantage Business Angels for whom I have a particularly high regard has said so too in "A First Sighting of Recovery" though for somewhat different reasons.

The only fly in the ointment I can see is that property prices are falling in China. This seems to be the result of government policy but if real estate has been taken as collateral it could affect the Chinese banking system. Then we would all be in trouble.

Product Design Consultants in Yorkshire

2011-12-07T11:01:00.005Z

By coincidence both the Sheffield and Leeds Inventors Groups had excellent presentations from product designers in November 2011.

John Biddleston of The Big Consultant spoke to Sheffield on 7 Nov. He has posted his slides to his blog which you can view and download here.

Alex Smith of TRIG Creative spoke to Leeds on 16 Nov 2011 and you can download his talk "Cost Effective Product Development" here.

John and Alex represent just two of many excellent design consultancies in Yorkshire. Others include Matthew Conley of HJC Design of Barnsley and Richard Hall of Pd-m International of Harrogate.

All of them are friends of the Leeds and Sheffield clubs.

Going for Grants

2011-11-22T21:54:00.010Z

Going for Grants is a double act between Tom Bathgate and Charles Lucas. Tom's background is in management while Charles is an accountant. They have joined forces to help businesses find grant funding. They operate from Manchester Science Park.

Tom and Charles visited Leeds Inventors Group last month and they are coming to Sheffield Central Library on 5 Dec 2011 at 18:00. Here is a review of their talk when they came to Leeds and here is my photo of Tom in full flow.

The team's central message was that despite austerity there are still plenty of grants and low interest loans but these funds are in no sense free money. The funds have to be identified. Proposals have to be drawn up. Once a grant is awarded or moneys are advanced there are likely to be conditions that have to be complied with. Failure or delay in complying with those conditions can slow the flow of cash or even result in a demand for repayment.

According to its website, Going for Grants assists businesses in five ways:

First, it looks for grant or soft loan funding that might be available to meet a business objective. Tom and Charles said at Leeds that they are often asked by businessmen what they should do to qualify for a grant. That is like putting a cart before a horse and it very rarely works. It is much better to plan the business and then look for funding whether grants, loans or even equity investment. In the talk I mentioned crowd funding and a new crowd funding venture by Amanda Boyle called Bloom VC. Tom, who is Scottish, had heard of Amanda through her work with Scottish Enterprise. Looking for available funding is not easy for a busy businessman or woman unless you know where to look. Tom and Charles do know where to look and they offer a preliminary search for £85 plus VAT.
Once it has reported, Going for Grants offers its clients a free consultation to discuss any funding opportunities that may have come to light.
If a funding opportunity is identified and the client wants to go for it Going for Grants will help him or her prepare a grant or loan application. Applications for the grant itself are usually made on a contingency basis but the company does charge for some services such as drafting a credible business plan.
If a grant is awarded Going for Grants helps the client meet deadlines and comply with conditions to make sure that the funds keep flowing.
Finally, they provide ongoing support in all aspects of the programme.

If you were not at Leeds last month it is certainly worthwhile coming to Sheffield on 5 Dec. The Sheffield Inventors Group meets the first Monday of most months and it has a good programme of speakers lined up. If anybody wants to discuss this article or any other topic he or she can call me on 0800 862 0055 or contact me through Facebook, Linkedin, Xing, twitter or through my contact form.

FabLabs - Jane Keats on "Factories of the Future"

2011-11-07T06:26:00.008Z

On 5 Aug 2011 I wrote about the Manchester FabLab and the global FabLab network in my IP North West blog. On 21 Sept and 3 Oct 2011 the Leeds and Sheffield Inventors Groups heard from a FabLab user.

Jane Keats, a young New Zealand designer who is principal of Studio 52, presented "Factories of the Future", an introduction to the FabLab movement and additive manufacturing. Jane's slides cover the following topics:

1. FabLabs

2. The next industrial revolution

3. Factory of the Future

4. Open Innovation, and

5. Her Personal Experiences.

Here is a review of her talk to the Leeds Group on the 21 Sept 2011 in the LIG blog.

We in the Inventors Club are very supportive of the FabLab movement and I have advised and assisted the Manchester FabLab on a pro bono basis. On 12 Oct 2011 I chaired an Introduction to Intellectual Property and Licensing where patent attorney Tom Hutchinson, intellectual property solicitor Michael Sandys and I gave presentations. I shall upload our slides to Slideshare and make them accessible through this blog in the next few days.

As the Leeds review states, Bradford City Council and others have plans to set up a FabLab in Keighley and I have been in touch with the local authority to offer it our support. I brought the FabLab movement to the attention of Councillor Mehboob Khan, deputy chair of the Leeds City Region Local Enterprise Partnership, at the LEP Summit on 9 Sept 2011 so there is every chance that the project will get the support it needs. I will keep you posted.

Venture Hothouse - a Sort of Virtual Silicon Valley

2011-10-05T05:26:00.005+01:00

Yesterday afternoon I met David Bagley at a seminar on private equity funding and initial public offerings hosted by Cobbetts at their spanking new offices in Leeds. David is a chartered accountant and a director of a number of companies including Finance Yorkshire which is how I got to know him. Over drinks he told me about Venture Hothouse of which he is chairman.

Venture Hothouse describes itself on its website as "a wealth of information for all those involved in business" and a cursory once over of the site certainly suggests that to be true. In the "Resources" section I found guidance on

how to construct a balance sheet, cash flow statement and a number of other financial projections;
how to organize a board meeting, a company flotation and an AGM;
how to prepare a 4Cs and 4Ps, a business plan an executive summary of a business plan and so so
how to register a patent, trade mark or domain name; and
how to set up various types of companies.

The blog section has articles on such things as cloud computing and project management. A "useful documents" page has all sorts of useful precedents from confidentiality agreements to consultancy contracts.

However, to get the best of the site it seems you have to register and that costs money: £180 per year for entrepreneurs and £300 for investors such as angels and VCs, professional advisers such as accountants and law firms, mentors and business service providers. A downloadable booklet explains what subscribers get for their money:

"The core of the ‘Entrepreneurs’ section is the ‘Investment Profile’. The ‘Investment Profile’ is a secure, private web portfolio which can ONLY be accessed by the subscribing entrepreneur - and by third parties nominated by the entrepreneur, e.g. potential investors – via a secure a username and password. The ‘Investment Profile’ can be assembled quickly and easily, and contains all the documentation which will be required by a potential investor to assess an investment opportunity."

Investors and service providers appear to get advertising or at least a listing which brings them to the attention of investment ready businesses whose financial statements have been prepared using tools available to subscribers to the service. Glancing through the directory I noticed that there were quite a few angel syndicates, patent agencies, accountancy practices and, alarmingly, insolvency practitioners on the list.

While explaining it to me yesterday David described the service as a sort of forum for entrepreneurs and investors. "A sort of virtual Silicon Valley?" I suggested. David beamed "I suppose so. I never really thought of it that way, but yes it is." "Ah well" I replied "if you ever do use that term you can pay me a royalty." "OK!" he promised. I think we have a contract there, don't you.

David has offered to speak to the Leeds and Sheffield inventors clubs so I am sending copies of this article to Ged and Stef in Leeds and Lynn in Sheffield so that they can issue invitations. I think quite a lot of members of both clubs would be interested in Venture Hothouse.

Returning to Cobbetts' swish offices, one of the most intriguing features were lifts with no buttons. Visitors have to choose a floor from a key pad outside the lift. Imagine the queue at 08:55 when everyone in all the offices of the building turns up for work or at 12:55 when everyone wants to grab some lunch. If anyone from 1 Whitehall Riverside reads this article, perhaps they would like to tell us how this system works in practice.

Sheffield Inventors Group: A Link with Hallam

2011-09-06T04:43:00.003+01:00

Sheffield Hallam University is literally just across the road from Sheffield Central Library which hosts the Sheffield Inventors Group. Yesterday we welcomed Heath Reed one of its principal industrial designers.

Heath specializes in

design research
industrial design
ergonomics
product development, and
design for manufacture.

He works in designfutures, the product and packaging innovation service of the University, and its Art and Design Research Centre.

In a wide ranging two way discussion Heath introduced us to the work of the University as a whole, its excellence in research and teaching and consultancy, its comprehensive Enterprise Centre, designfutures consultancy, the design process and how it fits into the innovation process and his own work. What made his talk particularly interesting is that Heath is himself an inventor and thus had first hand experience of the issues facing individual inventors.

The University has a massive array of expertise ranging from active lifestyles to workplace development. Anybody who wishes to get in touch with the Centre should call on 0114 225 5000.

Ian the Inventor's e-petition

2011-08-15T19:19:00.005+01:00

I have just received the following email from Mr Ian Davies, otherwise known as "Ian the Inventor":

"I've submitted an e-petition via the government e-petition website, the link is: http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/10956

It's suggesting that the Government encourage investment in inventors via grants or tax reliefs to businesses, I think we'd all like to have businesses more open to listening to us.

Please visit and register your vote, I'd also suggest you ask inventors, friends & contacts to do likewise.

In my case just one of my inventions has created work for over 12 UK businesses, I've no doubt that your members have created work for UK companies but how much more work could be created with a little encouragement?"

Makes more sense than restoring hanging or adding to homelessness. Ian's website is also worth a gander.

Inventors' Resources in Northern Ireland

2011-08-15T08:38:00.003+01:00

On Saturday I published a case note on the recent decision of Mr Justice Denney in Siemens AG v Seagate Technology [2011] NICh 12. That was a patent infringement case which came before the Northern Irish courts. There have not been such cases from Northern Ireland and many practitioners expressed amazement that it could happen at all.

I take a different view. If Northern Ireland is to flourish its businesses have to innovate and if those businesses are to innovate their investment in branding, designs, technology and creative works have to be protected. Accordingly I checked the resources that are already there and found that there was quite a lot going for Northern Ireland:

"There is the Queen's University in Belfast "a broadly based, research-driven university with a dynamic world-class research and education portfolio and strong international connections". There is the HALO Business Angel Network on the Northern Ireland Science Park. There is a patent information unit at Belfast Central Library which is more than can be said for Manchester now that Chris Brown has gone or Liverpool while it is refurbished. According to CIPA there are 4 patent agencies in Belfast, namely Ansons, F R Kelly, Hanna IP and Murgitroyd and three of those firms have "Trade Mark Experts" listed on the ITMA website. I would add that there is also the excellent Eddie O'Gorman who runs the PatentNAV IP Search and Management Service. So there is already a lot going for Northern Ireland."

I have not however been able to find a patent clinic or inventors club either in Belfast or any other city or town in Northern Ireland and I am not sure what sort of advice is available through Northern Ireland Business Information which seems to be the equivalent of Business Link.

I hope to visit Northern Ireland in the next few weeks to meet colleagues from the Northern Irish Bar, local patent and trade mark agents and solicitors specializing in intellectual property and technology, media and telecommunications law. I hope also to meet Mr McFarlane who is the head of the patents section of Belfast Central Library to gauge whether there would be any enthusiasm for local patent clinics and inventors clubs.

In he meantime, I have uploaded a page on the inventors' resources in Northern Ireland that I have been able to discover onto the Inventors Club website. Should anyone wish to discuss it please give me a ring on 0800 862 0055 or use my contact form.

"Growth Through Innovation" - Digby Jones at PERA

2011-07-26T23:29:00.011+01:00

Although Gordon Brown's trade minister, Baron Jones of Birmingh am, was top of the bill at PERA's "Growth through Innovation" conference yesterday, the real star for me was PERA itself.

PERA's head office is in the ancient Leicestershire market town of Melton Mowbray. And what comes to mind when the words Melton and Mowbray are pronounced. Why pork pies and Stilton cheese of course. I had planned to arrive at Melton Mowbray half an hour earlier to visit one of the retail outlets of the Melton Mowbray Pork Pie Association but I missed my exit while overtaking a stream of ponderous Eastern European lorries with the result that I arrived at the registration desk with just 20 minutes to spare. I asked a member of PERA's staff where one could buy a pork pie and portion of Stilton after the talk was due to end. She had a word with someone in the PERA staff canteen who offered me a massive pie and an enormous chunk of cheese for £6.80. Now how about that for customer service!

But fine dining is not all that PERA do. Before introducing the guest speaker, Dr. Mark Wareing, commercial director of PERA who chaired the meeting, told us that PERA had been founded immediately after the Second World War, that it does a wide range of consultancy work, that it employs 280 scientists and engineers, that it has connections with some of the biggest names in British industry, that it was the first business to comply with the new British standard in collaborative working, that it never seeks to retain intellectual property to the intellectual assets that it creates for its customers and that it has considerable experience in writing proposals for grant funding and accessing investment.

Among the people it helps are private inventors and one of them, a Mr. Alfred Hamer of Lincoln, sat next to me in the conference. He told me that he had obtained considerable assistance from PERA. Mr. Hamer has great concerns about enforcing intellectual property rights which he expressed in a question to Lord Digby Jones which, with his permission, I shall discuss at length in a future post.

Anyway, as I have mentioned, the top of the bill was Lord Digby Jones and here are my recollections of what he said. After expressing contentment at finding himself in the East Midlands and reeling off a list of the directorships of public companies and other posts of responsibility that he held in the region he made clear that he was not wedded to any political party. He referred to one well known politician as a "furry little creature elected on the block vote of the RSPCA" - which raised a few guffaws - and to another as having just finished his gap year - coming as it did an hour after the Chancellor had described the growth (or rather flat lining) figures as "good news" that reference raised a nervous titter from the audience. He told us how he had been offered a job in Gordon Brown's government and that he had accepted the offer for the good of business and the good of the country. He did so on two conditions. The first was that he would never have to join the Labour Party - though he accepted the Labour whip in the Lords - and the second was that he would be able to resign his office within 18 months. It was imperative in his view for government to work with the grain of business and not against it.

The main message that he had for us was that the 21st century was Asia's century in the sense that the 19th century had been ours and the 20th century the USA's. No doubt dreaming with BRICs he included Brazil in Asia. Demonstrating his mastery of the one-liner, he declaimed:. "You know they have just discovered Saudi Arabia off Rio" referring of course to the Tupu oil discovery.

Returning to China Digby Jones spoke of the tacit agreement between the Chinese government and its populace whereby the people would make no trouble provided the government improved steadily their standard of living. That deal was fuelling the rapid growth of China's economy. Such growth was a threat but also an opportunity for British industry but to resist that threat and take advantage of that opportunity we had to invest much more in R & D and even more in education. He excoriated the illiteracy and innumeracy statistics of our school leavers. Folk in Asia like a taxi driver from Chennai whom he met in the Gulf and the Chinese peasant. Unless we innovate, invest in R & D and proper training they would get it.

For all of this to happen, the mood music in the UK had to change. Folk who had acquired their wealth through business were objects of envy whereas those who had acquired it by pure chance such as a lottery win were feted. That attitude was wrong.

In the Q & A that followed Mr. Hamer complained about the difficulty of enforcing IP rights. His Lordship agreed that it was a problem. Being first in the market was the solution he proposed. Someone else asked about the prospect of default in Washington. "Too awful to contemplate" was Lord Digby Jones's reaaction, "but it shouldn't happen because the politicians are very close to a deal.

After I chatted with Mr Hamer and another inventor over a cup of tea Brian Binley MP rose to speak. Unlike most of his fellows on the green benches Binley had had a life in business before politics though it meant that at age 63 he was one of the House's oldest entrants. He made a number of interesting points:

(1) civil servants are good at getting facts and figures but not so good at management;

(2) we gold plate EU regulations when we implement them into our law;

(3) legislation should have sunset clauses and there should be impact assessments on the effect of new legislation on small business;

(4) SME should be exempted from some legislation such as maternity and paternity rights;

(5) banks should be made to play fair with SME; and

(6) practical skills should carry the same prestige as degrees.

Most interesting of all in view of the growth figures that morning was his call to stimulate demand. That could only come with a recovery in the property market he said. He called for the return of MIRAS at least for first time buyers to stimulate the housing market.

In Q & A I suggested that closing down the RDAs and local Business Links without putting anything in their place had turned out badly. He had several answers to that one of the most startling of which was that the local enterprise partnerships had access to funding. He later modified his answer by saying that RDAs had been a good thing in the North but perhaps less successful south of the Wash and that Business Link had been good for engineering.

The discussion lasted until 18:00 after which I trundled off up to Sheffield for a conference with a client on the way home. Though I didn't agree with everything that Digby Jones and Binley had to say it was a good day out for which PERA are to be congratulated.

"Oh Me. Oh My. I hope the Little Mentor Comes By" - The Banks New Mentoring Network

2011-07-22T09:38:00.006+01:00

"Oh me! Oh my. I hope the little lady comes by".

That was the chorus of "Leaning on a Lamp Post", one of the late George Formby's hits. I actually saw Formby perform the song after a pantomime at the Palace Theatre in London a few years before he died. I think it was the first time I had ever been in a theatre. My mother and one of my aunts, Northern exiles in the Smoke were entranced, though I couldn't see what the fuss was about. All I can remember was an old man who laughed at his own jokes quite a lot.

Anyway, I digress. I was reminded of the lyrics of the Formby song by the domain name of the new mentoring network, mentorsme.co.uk. According to its website:

"mentorsme.co.uk is operated by the Business Finance Taskforce, which has been set up by the British Bankers’ Association and is made up of five banks: Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds Banking Group, Royal Bank of Scotland and Santander. The taskforce was established to help businesses access the finance they need to grow."

This seems to be the new mentoring network that I discussed in "Son of Business Link" on 16 Nov last year. I have googled "Business Finance Task Force" and came up with this page and a report published last October on the British Bankers Association website.

mentorsme.co.uk describes itself as "Britain’s first online gateway for small and medium-sized enterprises looking for mentoring services." There is a database on the home page searchable by "Business Life Stage" and "Region".

I searched "Show All" for "Yorkshire and Humberside" and came up with "Success Doncaster" and "Business and Education South Yorkshire" plus a number of organizations offering national coverage some of which were on-line only organizations. I made the same search for North West England and came up with considerably more local organizations. I shall be checking these out over the next few days in my IP Yorkshire and IP North West blogs.

Not really a replacement for advisers of the calibre of Jane Hurn and Mary Roberts but better than nothing. I will keep you posted.

Sheffield Inventors Group: Taking Products to Market

2011-07-12T13:35:00.004+01:00

The guest speaker at Sheffield Inventors Group on 4 July 2011 was Mr. Richard Campos of Richard Camps Business Support Ltd. The title of his talk was Taking Products to Market. Here are his slides:

Richard illustrated his talk with a case study. He brandished a sheet of plain white plastic leaving us to guess what it was. It turned out to be a board to place under doors, skirting boards and other edges while painting. That simple invention had been turned into a successful product by successful placing on a home shopping channel.

Everyone gained a wealth of tips from that talk on:

market research - particularly the use of focus groups
tailoring IP protection to a specific need
adequate terms and conditions

and many other topics.

The Sheffield Inventors Group meets at Sheffield Central Library in Surrey Street on the first Monday of every month. Click here if you want to be notified of future events.

Manchester Inventors Group: The Essential Steps of Product Development

2011-07-02T21:48:00.004+01:00

Independent design pro Steven Bookbinder will be guest speaker at the next meeting of Manchester Inventors Group on Tuesday, 5 July 2011 at 18:00.

The title of his talk is "The Essential Steps of Product Development". According to the Group's website, it will cover:

- general development process and reducing risk
- sustainable innovation
- materials and the importance of getting them right
- turning a good idea into a great idea
- what is quality, knowing when you can and can't cut corners
- the harsh reality of what it takes to get the big boys to bite.

The meeting takes place at City Library, Elliott House, 151 Deansgate, Manchester, M3 3UK.

Angels: Cambridge Capital added to the List

2011-06-30T23:45:00.002+01:00

Cambridge Capital describes itself as "a leading business angel group of 40 investors that have been investing in hi-tech businesses for ten years." Its members claim to have invested several million pounds into 25 companies in the Cambridge area.

I have added Cambridge Capital's details to the East of England Angels page of our Inventors Club. Further information about resources for inventors in the region are in the East of England page of our website.

For further information on this topic call NIPC East on 01603 343030 or click our East of England contact form.

Resources for Inventors in the West Midlands

2011-06-28T01:35:00.010+01:00

The region known as "the West Midlands" consists of

the metropolitan county of the West Midlands with its metropolitan boroughs of Birmingham, Coventry, Dudley, Sandwell, Solihull, Walsall and Wolverhampton,
the shire counties of Staffordshire, Warwickshire and Worcestershire and
the unitary authorities of Hereforshire, Shropshire, Telford and Wrekin and Stoke-on-Trent.

The region covers an area of just over 13,000 square kilometres and has a population of 5.27 million.

Regional Development

The regional development agency for the West Midlands is Advantage West Midlands. This will be abolished with all the other RDA by March 2012. However, proposals for local enterprise partnerships have been accepted for:

Angels

There are at least two local business angel networks:

Central England Business Angels ("CEBA") of Henley in Arden; and
MINERVA of the University of Warwick University science park.

Clinics

Local patent attorneys offer free consultations at Birmingham Central Library in conjunction. NIPC Clinics will also introduce inventors and their investors, lenders and professional advisors to local patent and trade mark attorneys, business advisors, product design consultants, lawyers and others.

Community Development Finance Institutions

There are at least 6 community development finance institutions in the West Midlands:

Aston Reinvestment Trust of Birmingham;
Black Country Reinvestment Society of Wolverhampton Science Park;
Coventry & Warwickshire Reinvestment Trust;
East Lancs Moneyline of Staffordshire;
Impetus Rural Reinvstment in the Marches; and
StreetUK of Birmingham.

Inventors Clubs

There are inventors clubs in Birmingham, Kingswinford and Malvern.

Professional Advice

Members of NIPC West Midlands offer specialist advice and advocacy on intellectual property, information technology, telecommunications, media, entertainment and competition law. We can be reached on 0121 286 1551 or through our national contact form.

Further Information

Further information on inventors resources in the West Midlands will be published on the Inventors Club website.

Local Enterprise Partnerships: A Great Resource

2011-06-09T14:22:00.004+01:00

Lorna Gibbons. local economic evidence coordinator of The South West Observatory publishes a great blog on local enterprise partnerships ("LEP") called Economic Development.

Particularly useful is her post of 7 June 2011 on BIS LEP Contact Information. This gives names, phone numbers, email addresses and areas of every contact in every LEP in the kingdom. This supplements another great post the previous day "Everything you need to know about each LEP .... contact and priorities where available".

Here's a sample entry for Leeds City Region, my local LEP:

"Website: http://www.leedscityregion.gov.uk/LEP.htm

Linkedin: Leeds City Region LEP

Twitter: @LeedsCityRegion

Event Leeds City Region LEP Summit
9 September 2011 Royal Armouries, Leeds http://www.leedscityregionsummit2011.com/summit/home.cfm Twitter event hashtag #lepsummit2011

Alternative contact lcr@leedscityregion.gov.uk or calling the Leeds City Region Secretariat on 0113 2474227.

May Newsletter: http://tiny.cc/vgw6l

Board members:
http://www.leedscityregion.gov.uk/lepboard.htm

Key Objectives for the LEP – an Integrated Strategy and Investment Plan
The LEP Board considered a report on integrating Leeds City Region existing strategies to produce a single streamlined strategy and investment plan to help guide the activity of both the LEP and Leaders Boards effectively. Each Board would in turn produce a Strategic Delivery Plan.
This approach will ensure that both Boards have a single, clear focal point of reference in terms of the Partnership’s vision and mission objectives.
The draft will be published for consultation and presented at the LEP Summit on the 9th September 2011."

Altogether it's great stuff.

Venturefest - the Original

2011-06-07T22:46:00.002+01:00

I have just come back from Venturerfest. Not the one on York race course that takes place in February which I have attended every year since 2005 but the Oxford original now in its 13th year. Even though it meant getting up at 05:00 this morning, driving 320 miles along congested motorways and paying sky high parking charges in Oxford town centre because the P + R was full the event was worth attending.

Venturefest - for those who have never heard of it - is an exhibition and series of workshops which are free together with an optional breakfast and dinner which are not. The breakfast starts at 07:00 and the dinner finishes not far short of midnight so it can be a very long day indeed. The idea seems to be to bring together the universities with local businesspeople and professionals. The talks follow themes called "streams" in Oxford and "tracks" in York. This was today's programme for Oxford and last February's for York. These were the exhibitors today at Oxford and the "Innovation Showcase" exhibitors at York.

So how do the two events compare? Though I hate to admit it as I am a Northerner (Mancunian by birth but having a Yorkshire mother and living in Holmfirth) the difference between Venturefest and Venturefest Yorkshire was pretty well the same as the difference between Harvey Nicks in Knightsbridge and its Briggate offshoot.

For a start the Oxford venue was so much more impressive and convenient. It takes place at the University's business school which was opened by Romano Prodi, the former president of the European Commission and Prime Minister of Italy. The lecture theatre, where the funding stream talks and pitches took place, was opened by President Nelson Mandela and bears his name. Interesting modern sculptures lined the corridors. By contrast the York event takes place at the race course centre which is a rabbit warren of a building with two sets of stairs leading to floors at different levels. Consequently, the only way to get from the upper floor off one set of stairs is to descend to the ground floor and then go up the other. About the only advantage that York race course has over Said is that you can park free of charge near the entrance and it doesn't require an hour to crawl from the Botley interchange to Worcester Street.

Then the speakers were so much more interesting. I particularly enjoyed Prof Collier's presentation on the HiPER project whose enthusiasm for his subject was infectious. He explained simply but thoroughly not shying away from simple equations in terms that even a media studies graduate or at least a classicist could understand how lasers make hydrogen fuse into helium thus releasing enormous energy. I really envy his students. Frank Salzgeber of the European Space Agency was impressive too. So, too, were the VC panel in the funding stream. Alas, because of congestion on the M1 I missed the opening talk by Prof. Andrew Hamilton, principal of Oxford University, on universities as an engine of growth to which I was particularly looking forward.

The Oxford exhibition, which was in a marquee, was smaller than the one in York but I spent a lot longer going around it. Dehns and Gill Jennings & Every were there and it was good to meet Laura Ramsay of Dehns and Peter Finnie and Karen Connolly of GJE. Also B4. the two universities, the Knowledge Transfer Network, the Oxfordshire LEP, product design consultants, developers of ingenious software and lots of other interesting folk.

Altogether a very good day out and I hope to be back next year.

Tarzanned! RGF Roadshow York 1 June 2011

2011-06-02T12:51:00.005+01:00

On paper the regional growth fund ("RGF") looks like a good idea. Recognizing that cuts in public spending are likely to cause considerable distress in certain parts of the country, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills ("BIS") has allocated £1.4 billion to support projects and programmes that lever private sector investment to create economic growth and sustainable employment. BIS aims particularly to help those areas and communities currently dependent on the public sector.

About £450,000 of that money has already been allocated in a bidding round that began on 28 Oct 2010 and ended on 21 Jan 2011. According to the summary of first round bids the fund received 464 bids for £2.76 billion of which 299 were for amounts of £1 to 5 million. A list of winners and the number of jobs that the fund has created or saved appears on the RGF Round 1 Analysis page of the BIS website.

The remaining £950,000 is now up for grabs in a bidding process that will close on at 12:00 on 1 July 2011. Bids for tranches of £1 million or more are invited from private bodies and public private partnerships anywhere in England from any sector of the economy. However, since the aim is to create sustainable private sector jobs bids will not be entertained from local authorities or other public sector bodies without private sector partners. Each bid that meets the funding criteria will be judged against every other bid by a ministerial panel consisting of Nick Clegg. Vince Cable, Danny Alexander and a few Tories who act on the advice of a panel of the great and the good chaired by Lord Heseltine.

Detailed guidance to applicants is set out in Regional Growth Fund: Round 2 Information for Applicants and this is supplemented by a whole slew of Frequently Asked Questions and a blog by Sir Ian Wrigglesworth, deputy chairman of the advisory panel and some other worthies including Uncle Vince himself who has written about Learning for Life without the slightest hint of irony. As I learned on Wednesday that not everybody bidding for taxpayers' money actually reads or understands this guidance, BIS has arranged a series of roadshows around the country to spell out the criteria and to introduce bods who have already interest in these handouts to the officials who will actually dole them out.

I caught up with the roadshow at York which was held in the Ron Cooke Hub of York University on 1 June. Anyone clicking the last link will see the words "Room to Engage, Inspire and Innovate" on the building's web page, but situated as it was on the banks of what appeared to be a gravel pit in a landscape of near lunar desolation they were not the first words that came to my mind. Nevertheless, I was warmed up by a cup of tea and a low calorie KitKat generously provided by the University before the session began.

The roadshow was opened by Prof. Brian Cantor, Principal of the University, who said that York was doing very nicely as it was thank you, surviving the economic downturn better than anywhere outside London and the South East. "So well, in fact", remarked Lord Heseltine, "that we might just as well pack it in and go back right now". After a nervous titter from the audience, his lordship remembered that there were probably folk from places less favoured than Henley (or even Honley) such as Donnie, Pontie and Wakie not to mention great swathes of Bradford and Sheffield, and got on with his speech.

I had previously met Lord Heseltine (then known as Goldilocks or Tarzan) in my Tory days during the 1983 election campaign when he was Minister of Defence I was a ward chair in Ilford South. I drove him in our candidate's campaign minibus around the streets of that suburb as he harangued bemused Pakistani housewives queuing for rice and lentils on the virtues of Trident and the cruise missiles that the US government were stationing at Greenham Common and Molesworth. As I negotiated a very narrow opening between two badly parked cars one of the local supporters quipped "You'll have a lot less trouble winning this election, mate". And so it turned out as Labour was clobbered not only in Ilford but also in the rest of the country.

"What a difference 28 years makes," I thought. Not only was Goldilocks no longer golden - though he still had a shock of grey hair - but he lost his place in his speech blaming the hapless typist for typing it on both sides of the paper. However, it did contain some substance. Most of what he said can be found in the guidance to which I have just referred above but he did make three important points that I think are worth stressing. First, he emphasized the importance of gearing - that is to say leveraging lolly from the private sector. In the first round an average of £5 had been raised for every £1 from the fund. Secondly, RGF funding is not to be compared with the sort of subventions that used to be available through the regional development agencies. There's a finite pot of money available for distribution to where it is most needed. "After it's gone it's gone" Goldilocks said to a questioner who asked whether there would be a third round. And finally a pot of £150 million has been set aside specifically for bids from small and medium enterprises ("SME").

There then followed questions and answers which I opened (well someone had to). "Hasn't the process of running down the RDAs and Business Link, which business people and their professional advisers are used to, and replacing it with a RGF where bidding started in October and will finish in June been far too quick?" I asked. "Won't that affect the quality of the bids in that well thought out projects that require research and thorough preparation will fail to meet the deadline?" Bristling at the question he entered "Me Tarzan You Jane" mode. "How many people here are making bids?" A forest of hands erupted. "Well there's your answer" he said as he proceeded to the next question. "Well no it isn't" I would have responded had I been allowed to do so. "What's missing are the really useful projects that could make much better use of taxpayers' money if they only had more time." The number of jobs saved throughout the country on the list of winners website does not seem all that impressive a use of £450 million to me.

Someone else asked about a coaching project. "Never heard of it" retorted Goldilocks. "You can't get money for coaching though you might get money for factory where you have to coach your staff." Someone from Leeds asked how a bidder can justify money for an area which contains areas of affluence as well as pockets of poverty. "One of the most difficult dilemmas of the fund" conceded Heseltine, "but one that affects London and Manchester as well." Each project will be judged on the number of jobs it saves or creates regardless of geography.

After morning coffee in the building's atrium, where I met Bill McBeth of the Textile Centre of Excellence in Huddersfield and Jay Mehta of Cobbetts, there was a technical session by a panel of four of the officials who take part in the assessment process. What struck me was just how unattractive the RGF must be for most SME. First, there is a threshold of £1 million which with leveraging means that they have to devise a project requiring funds of £5 million. Secondly, they have to meet a very tight timetable - 12 April to 1 July for the present round. Thirdly, there is no scope for negotiation of the terms as one of the panellists confirmed in answer to another of my questions. Fourthly, successful bidders have to pay an unspecified amount of money for due diligence. Finally, each offer letter will contain a clawback provision that will allow BIS to recover the grant if the project fails to deliver the promised number of jobs.

From BIS's point of view the roadshow must have been a success. There were lots of local opinion setters such as Peter Massey from the Arts Council and Philip Bartey of Sheffield LEP. However, as I made my way back towards my car on some waste ground across the windswept landscape I was much less enthusiastic about the RGF when I left than I was when I came.

Business Startup Show

2011-05-21T06:48:00.009+01:00

My first impressions of the Business Startup show at the Excel Centre yesterday were not good.

After getting up at 04:00 in the morning to drive 320 kilometres along motorways and dual carriageways from Yorkshire my mood was not exactly mollified by the appalling pedestrian sign posting to the exhibition hall from the main car park. Clad for the Yorkshire summer in the appreciably milder Southern climate and shod in courts (though mercifully not heels) I was not best pleased when I found myself exactly where I started from after following the signs to the Excel Centre religiously for 20 minutes.

"Don't take any notice of the sign posts, love" said a friendly fellow Northerner when I complained that looking for the Excel Centre was a bit like a treasure hunt. She pointed me in the opposite direction to the street signs and sure enough a few hundred metres away the "Abu Dhabi National Exhibition Centre" beckoned.

Once inside the noisy and crowded exhibition hall the mishmash of stands with business coaches cheek and jowl with web designers gave the impression of a BNI business breakfast on a monumental scale.

I was looking out for Simon Brown of the UIA so that I could say "hello" but their stand at 378 seemed to have been occupied by some space business. I also wanted to see Claire Mitchell of Clilipeeps but there was no sign of her either.

I had booked for some seminars and found a seat in the

session on web design where the speaker droned on barely audible against the general hubbub. Had it not been for the fact that I had to fumble in my bag for my parking ticket long enough to exceed the 2-hour band by seconds I would have left the exhibition there and then. However, as I was now stung for £10 for 2 to 6 hours parking I decided to get my moneysworth. I trundled back to the exhibition centre for another couple of hours.

Then the show got a whole lot better. First, I met a few familiar faces such as Gary Townley from the Intellectual Property Office and Richard Quick from Successful Sites of St. Andrews. Next, I actually picked up something useful - a free copy Jolly & Philpott "Handbook of European IP Management" from the Mewburn Ellis stand which I shall review in due course. I bowled a Yorker at Darren Westlake of Crowdcube on the compatibility of crowd funding with company and securities law which he played with aplomb. David Larkin of Salesforce gave an excellent introduction to the Cloud and Web 2.0 as well as his company's CRM product. Finally, there were two informative presentations by Sage on their online bookkeeping service and business planning software which I may actually use.

Not quite a wasted journey. Will I come back next year? Probably not unless someone invites me to give a talk. But it was a good excuse for a weekend London.

Crowd Funding: No Waffle

2011-05-12T15:06:00.000+01:00

@nowaffle is the twitter name of Scottish entrepreneur, Amanda Boyle.

Amanda has an impressive track record in business:

Founder and former CEO of Caledonia Contracts Ltd
Non-executive chairman of Scottish Enterprise
Founder of luxury goods retailer Bijou.

Her latest venture is Bloom VC. When I met her just outside St. Andrews last month she explained that the initials VC stand not for venture capital but venture catalyst. As the company explains on its website:

So you’ve got this great idea for a business …

You need some funding to get it
off the ground, but you don’t have the money. You could ask the bank, but with no proven financial or business track record it’s unlikely they could help. You could ask your mum, but it’s a big ask. It would be shame to miss out on the opportunity, but what to do?
Why not ask the crowd?
It’s simple really. Crowdfunding is just an alternative source of money to help you start up your own business or fund a brilliant community project."

Crowd funding is a new concept in the UK and it is not without legal pitfalls, but the concept has attracted a lot of serious interest (see "The Micro Price of Micropatronage" Economist 27 Sep 2010). It is an entirely new source of funding that social networking makes possible. For inventors and other entrepreneurs it can't be worse than going on a reality TV show like Dragons' Den or the Apprentice.

Resources for Inventors in South West England

2011-04-11T09:43:00.003+01:00

South West England consists of the counties of Cornwall, Devon, Dorset, Gloucestershire, Somerset and Wiltshire. the city of Bristol and the Isles of Scilly. The region covers an area of 23,828 square kilometres and has a population of just under 5 million.

Regional Development

The regional development agency for the region is the South West Regional Development Agency. This will be abolished with all the other RDAs by March 2012. Proposals for local enterprise partnerships have been accepted for:

Bath and North East Somerset (The West of England LEP); and
Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly.

Clinics

There are clinics at Bristol Central Library and the University of Plymouth. Inventors in South West England can also access online advice and, where appropriate, introduction to local patent and trade mark agents and other intellectual property practitioners through NIPC Clinics.

Community Development Finance Institutions

There are three CDFIs in South West England:

Bristol Enterprise Development Fund for the Bristol Metropolitan Area
Frederick's Foundation which has branches in Devon, Dorset, Gloucester, Somerset and Wiltshire; and
South West Investment Group which covers the whole of the region.

Inventors Clubs

The South West Inventors Club meets on the third Wednesday of the month at Yeovil to discuss members' inventions, intellectual property, funding and other matters.

Libraries

There are PATLib libraries at Bristol and Plymouth.

Professional Advice

We are building up a network of local patent and trade mark attorneys, specialist solicitors and other professionals in South West England. You can access that network by calling us on 0117 325 6300.

Further Information

We have a page on inventors' resources in South West England on the Inventors' Club website which we shall update and expand as and when we can. We have an Inventors Club group on Linkedin and you can of course join the Inventors Club itself. If you want to contact us you can also get in touch through our contact form.

Patent Ownership Co-Ownership and Corporate Ownership

2011-04-07T18:10:00.003+01:00

This was the title of Roger Lowe's talk to Sheffield Inventors Group on Monday. Roger is proprietor of ip4all, an intellectual property consultancy in Huddersfield.

He began his talk by quoting Mark Getty:

"Intellectual property is the oil of the 21 century. Look at the richest men a hundred years ago; they all made their money extracting natural resources or moving them around. All today’s richest men have made their money out of intellectual property."

Roger then discussed patents as property rights, something that can be bought, sold or charged. He considered ownership and warned that:

"The mere suggestion of co-ownership of patents makes the blood of IP practitioners run cold."
Co-ownership must be adopted only as a last resort.

Too true. He then explained why. Having told us why co-ownership is a bad thing he considered some of the alternatives such as licensing and corporate ownership. The best time to consider these issues is before the application for a patent but not every patent agent tells you that.

There will be no Inventors' Group meeting for May because the first Monday falls on the Mayday Bank Holiday but there will be an exhibition at Central Library to celebrate World IP Day on 26 April 2011. If you want to join the club or set up an inventors' club in your own area call us on 0800 862 0055 or complete our contact form.

Goodbye Chis and Thanks

2011-04-06T00:08:00.005+01:00

Today I learned that Chris Brown, the City Library's patent librarian is to retire. Chris has done much for inventors and entrepreneurs in the North. She is a very skillful business and patents researcher. She runs the Manchester IP clinics. She is treasurer of the Manchester Inventors Group. I should like to add my thanks to those of many others for all her help over the years and wish her a long and happy retirement. At the end of their meeting this evening the members of Group gave Chris a little present. This photo shows Chris making her acceptance speech.

Now losing Chris is bad enough but worse is that she is not to be replaced. The City will try to make do with non-specialist librarians. Now those librarians are no doubt very capable and dedicated professionals but they cannot be expected to find their way round esp@cenet or understand the results in the way that Chris can.

Having been born at Lorna Lodge in Barlow Moor Road I can proudly claim to be a Mancunienne. For most of my career I have practised from chambers in Manchester and have thus contributed to the City's coffers. As much of the Council's expenditure over the years has struck me as utterly profligate I am all for making savings. But not replacing Chris is a false economy.

Other cities are actually expanding their business and patents information services to fill the gap left by Business Link (see "Mark Prisk announces new business Advisory service" 8 Sep 2010 RealBusiness). I hope that the Council thinks again for the sake of the City and, indeed, country.

Sheffield and Manchester Inventors Clubs

2011-04-03T09:46:00.004+01:00

Two interesting events that dovetail very well together:

Sheffield Inventors Group will present a talk by Roger Lowe of IP4All on patenting and making sure that you have title to your invention at Sheffield Central Library at 18:00 tomorrow (see my article in IP Yorkshire for details).
Manchester Inventors Group will present a talk by Steve Reece of the Rich Inventor programme on the top 11 mistakes inventors make in selling their inventions at Manchester City Library at 19:00 on Tuesday, 5 April 2011 (see my article in IP North West for further information).

I shall be chairing the Sheffield event and I hope to get along to the Manchester talk. I will certainly blog Roger's talk and I hope to write something about the Steve's too.

Resources for Inventors in South East England

2011-04-02T21:00:00.004+01:00

South East England consists of the counties of Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, East Sussex, Hampshire, Isle of Wight, Kent, Oxfordshire, Surrey and West Sussex. The region covers just under 19,096 square kilometres and has a population of just over 8 million.

Regional Development

The regional development agency for the region is the SEEDA (South East England Development Agency). This will be abolished with all the other agencies by the end of March in 2012. Proposals for local enterprise partnerships have been accepted for the following areas:

Coast to Capital: Brighton, Croydon, Gatwick Triangle, East Sussex and Surrey;
Enterprise M3 (North East Hampshire and West Surrey)
Kent and Greater Essex and East Sussex
Oxfordshire City Region
Solent
Thames Valley and Berkshire

Business Angels

There are no less than 4 angel networks:

Clinics

A clinic is run by local patent agents at Southampton Central Library on the last Wednesday of the month between 17:00 and 19:00. Local inventors can also access NIPC Clinics through our website or call us on 023 9316 2030.

Community Development Finance Institutions

There are no less than 5 Community Development Finance Institutions in South East England:

Inventors Club

The Wessex Round Table of Inventors is based in Southampton. It holds regular monthly meetings and offers advice on funding, IP, licensing, marketing and other matters. It also has an excellent blog and website.

Libraries

Portsmouth Central Library is the only PATLib library in the region. However, clinics are held not there but in Southampton.

Professional Advice

We are building up a network of local patent and trade mark attorneys, specialist solicitors and other professionals in South East England. You can access that network by calling us on 023 9316 2030.

Further Information

We have a page on inventors resources in the South East on the Inventors Club website which we shall update and expand as and when we can. We have an Inventors Club Group on Linkedin and you can of course join the Inventors' Club. The rules are here and use this form to join.

Business Support Update

2011-03-21T10:52:00.005Z

For many years the first port of call for inventors was their local Business Link. Although Business Link's national website will remain, its regional and local services will begin to disappear from the end of March 2011. Opinion is divided as to whether the abolition of those services will be a good thing but it is a reality and we have to get used to it.

Free advice for inventors will continue to be available from the PATLib libraries such as Leeds Central Library and the British Library Business and IP Centre. Several of those libraries host patent clinics in conjunction with the Chartered Institute of Patent Attorneys and Ideas 21. You can also book a free 30 minute consultation with a patent or trade mark attorney, specialist lawyer, product development consultant, business advisor or other professional by clicking on the NIPC Clinics website or calling us on 0800 862 0055.

We can also put you in touch with an inventors club or help you set up your own in your area. There you can learn from other inventors or meet local professionals. You can also join us for free newsletters and updates. We can help you in practical ways - introducing you to trusted professionals, business angel networks and community finance development institutions or by negotiating discounts for you with IP insurers or product design consultants.

If you are willing to pay for business advice check out our accountants page for information on start-ups and funding offered by the ICAEW and other professional bodies. There are also plenty of good coaching and mentoring schemes some of whcih are offered through your local chamber of commerce.

I have today updated the NIPC Inventors Club website to take account of those developments. If you want us to keep you up to date contact us through our contact form or call us on 0800 862 0055.

Innovation in Africa - Bola Olabisi

2011-03-05T06:26:00.011Z

When I visited Sierra Leone in 2007 I was impressed by the resourcefulness and energy of the people. This was a country that had emerged recently from a vicious civil war (the subject of the film "Blood Diamond"). Though ranked close to the bottom in terms of nominal GDP, 12th from the bottom on the Human Development Index and 8th from the bottom on the Human Poverty Index I found the country boiling with inventiveness.

Take their use of mobile phones for example. The capital, Freetown, had frequent power cuts yet everyone was on line - not with computers but with mobile phones. They were used not simply as phones but for the rapid transfer of funds, market intelligence (the boys on the streets of the second city Bo knew the market rate for sterling long before the commercial banks), the electoral register (the committee rooms for one of presidential candidates in the general election were in my hotel), sports news (all the English Premier League clubs have legions of supporters and the scores are followed miles from the nearest TV set), calculators by schoolgirls from the Annie Walsh Memorial School not to mention traders in Big Market for quite complex maths and stores of vast amounts of visual and textual information.

The reason I mention all this is that I recently watched a presentation by Bola Olabisi to TED (Technology, Education and Design) in which she said that if you want something badly enough you will invent it. This presentation is inspiring so please do watch it. Bola Olabisi has founded GWIN (Global Women Inventors & Innovators Network) which has itself launched the British Female Inventor & Innovator Network.

We have all heard of the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China) as the economic powerhouses of the future but many countries in Africa will be important too. Scroll down to the bottom of the nominal GDP page and you will see forecasts for 2050 based on IMF data showing Nigeria's GDP of US$4,640,000 million as not that far behind our own US$5,133,000 million and considerably more than Italy's US$2,950.000. There are other countries in Africa with at least as much potential - South Africa, Egypt, Kenya and Ghana to name but 4. In 40 years time these countries will be major markets but also sources of technology for here.

Do we need a UIA in Britain?

2011-01-31T01:25:00.003Z

The letters UIA stand for United Inventors Association. According to its website it is "a non-profit [organization] dedicated to inventor education and support." It delivers such education and support through videos, a blog, a monthly newsletter, internet radio station and other channels. The Association also registers local inventors clubs, accredits service providers and negotiates discounts for members from approved suppliers.

There are three grades of membership:

Inventor;
Club Member; and
Premium.

Internet and club membership are free. Premium members pay an annual subscription of US$99. All members get the newsletter, list of friendly companies. discounts from service providers and the "Spot a Scam" video. Club members - that is to say, paid up members of affiliated clubs - get all the benefits of inventor membership plus a 5-part mini service and an invitation to a cocktail party at the "National Hardware Show". Premium members get a 10-part mini service, access to inventor resources and an opportunity to attend the filming of the "As seen on TV show" as well as the other benefits of club membership. According to the sponsorship page, there are over 10,000 members of the UIA.

Service providers can join as "silver", "gold" or "platinum medallion" sponsors. Silver medallion membership costs US$499, gold US$1,999 and platinum US$4,999. Sponsors appear to include lawyers, patent attorneys, publishers and many other professionals.

The UIA has a Code of Ethics which covers personal and professional integrity, governance, legal compliance, responsible stewardship and openness and disclosure. Any business that wishes to sponsor the the UIA must promise to operate in accordance with those ethics (see the eligibility criteria for sponsorship).

The strength of the UIA is that it plugs local inventors' clubs with a nationwide community. This gives it the numbers to negotiate discounts with service providers. It also enables each club to offer its members a much wider range of resources that it could possibly offer by itself. There is clearly a need for an organization like the UIA in this country.

Resources for Inventors in Yorkshire and the Humber

2011-01-23T22:13:00.010Z

Yorkshire and the Humber consists of the metropolitan counties of West and South Yorkshire, the shire county of North Yorkshire and the unitary authorities of York, Kingston upon Hull, North Lincolnshire and North East England. Major cities include Leeds, Bradford, Sheffield, Hull and York. The region covers just over 15,420 square kilometres and has a population of 5.14 million.

Regional Development

Yorkshire Forward is the regional development agency for Yorkshire and the Humber. This agency will be abolished with the other regional development agencies by March 2012. Proposals for local enterprise partnerships have been accepted for the Leeds and Sheffield City Regions.

Business Advisers

Business Link Yorkshire is based at 1 Capitol Court Capitol Business Park, Dodworth, Barnsley, S75 3TZ. Tel: 0845 604 8048, At present it can field a team of business advisers in all parts of Yorkshire and Humberside who can offer advice and mentoring and access to other sources of advice. It also runs conferences, workshops and seminars throughout the region. The regional Business Link networks are due to be disbanded in the next few months. Taking their place will be private consultancies such as Business Doctors and business coaches like Gail Cherry of Torchlight Consulting.

Business Angels

There is a local angel network known as YABA (Yorkshire Association of Business Angels).

Clinics

NIPC Clinics offers specialist IP advice throughout Yorkshire and the Humber and beyond. Local clinics staffed by local patent agents are also operated by the Chartered Institute of Patent Attorneys at Leeds and Sheffield Central Libraries.

Community Development Finance Institutions

There are no less than 9 community development finance institutions in Yorkshire and the Humber:

Acorn Fund

Bees Knees

Business Enterprise Fund

Donbac

Financial Inclusion Services Yorkshire

Goole Development Trust

Key Fund Yorkshire

Sirius Small Business Advice Centre

South Yorkshire Investment Fund

Inventors Clubs

There are inventors clubs in Leeds and Sheffield.

Libraries

There are Patent Information Centres at Leeds and Sheffield Central Libraries.

Professional Advisors

Jane Lambert, the only specialist intellectual property counsel outside London, practises from the Media Centre in Huddersfield. Specialist solicitors include Kate Reid, James Love, Sara Ludlam and Dai Davis. Patent agents with whom we work closely include Jane Bray, Peter Draggett, Dan Bates, Chris Hemingway and Michael Harrison. Ros Beattie of Company Solutions offers high quality accountancy services for start-ups and other small businesses. Richard Hall of pd-m International is a recommended product design consultant.

Further Information

We have a page on inventors' resources in Yorkshire and Humberside on the Inventors Club websitewhich we shall expand and update as and when we can. We have an Inventors Club group on Linkedin which covers developments affecting inventors throughout the UK. You can of course also join the Inventors Club if you want. The membership rules are here. There is no subscription but we may charge for special services such as showcasing inventions and access to professional services. Anyone who wishes to contact us should call us on 0113 320 3232 or use our online form.

Inventor Forum

2011-01-22T02:06:00.005Z

Inventor Forum can best be described as a consultancy for private inventors. It was started by Simon Brown who is a private inventor who has brought his invention successfully to market.

According to the company's website,

"Simon recognized that he would have done a lot of things differently, and saved significant time and money in doing so. But there was nobody to turn to who could provide the upfront, comprehensive road map and basic knowledge that he really needed ... so Simon has set up Inventor Forum. Bringing together a range of people who have been directly involved in a number of successful invention-based businesses from 'ground zero;, Simon can give inventors access to the knowledge, experience and support of a network of business partners, associates and professional specialist advisers (lawyers, accountants, etc) who have proven they understand the needs of the inventor-entrepreneur."

The company provides this service in three stages:

1 an initial evaluation

2 an extended consultation whereby Inventor Forum provides a comprehensive start-up guide with information on market research, intellectual property, tax, fund raising and so on; and

3. ongoing support and assistance.

Inventor Forum also offers services such as market research and pitched preparation to established businesses.

You can contact Simon at

Inventor Forum Ltd
Motivo House
Bluebell Road
Yeovil
Somerset
BA20 2FG

Tel: +44(0)1935 475525

Mob: +44(0)788 9911493

You can also follow him on twitter and Linkedin.

Resources for Inventors in North West England

2010-12-05T18:48:00.007Z

North West England consists of the counties of Cheshire, Cumbria, Greater Manchester, Lancashire and Merseyside. It includes the Greater Manchester and Merseyside metropolitan areas as well as Blackburn, Blackpool, Burnley, Carlisle, Chester, Lancaster, Preston and Warrington The region covers just under 14,165 square kilometres and has a population of just over 8.85 million.

Regional Development

The North West Regional Development Agency has co-ordinated regional development until now. This agency will be abolished together with the other regional development agencies by March 2012. Proposals have been accepted for local enterprise partnerships for Cheshire and Warrington, Cumbria, Greater Manchester and Liverpool City Region.

Business Link

Business Link North West is based at Brian Johnson Way, Preston, PR2 5PE, Tel 0845 00 66 888. There are local advisers throughout the region.

Clinics

The Chartered Institute of Patent Attorneys usually holds patent clinics in Liverpool and Manchester Central Libraries but both of these libraries are closed for refurbishment. The Manchester clinic has moved temporarily to Manchester City Library at Elliott House, 151 Deansgate and meets every third Thursday. The Liverpool clinic is still looking for a new venue. Blackburn and Darwen Library arrange occasional clinics with local patent agents at Blackburn Central Library on request.

Funding

There is an angel network known as North West Business Angels.

There are no less than seven community development finance institutions in North West England:

BBV (Bolton Business Ventures Ltd.);
Business Finance Solutions;
CART (Cumbria Asset Reinvestment Trust);
East Lancs Moneyline;
Lancashire Community Finance;
Merseyside Special Investment Fund; and
Moneyline Greater Manchester.

Inventors Clubs

There are inventors clubs in Blackburn (Ideas North West), Liverpool and Manchester. Like the Liverpool patent clinic, the Liverpool Inventors Club is looking for a temporary home pending the refurbishment of Liverpool Central Library.

Libraries

There are Patent Information Centres (also known as "PATLib libraries) in Liverpool and Manchester Central Libraries. Both libraries are being refurbished. The Manchester patent library has moved temporarily to City Library at 151 Deansgate. Blackburn Central Library operates an Inventors Information Point with an extensive collection of resources.

Professional Advisers

NIPC was the first and remains the only intellectual property chambers outside London was established in Manchester in 1997. Alex Khan is based in Manchester.

Janet Bray who practises from Hebden Bridge is on our patent attorneys' panel.

Michael Sandys and Joanne Shelley are solicitors specializing in intellectual property.

Michael Swift is a chartered accountant with experience of advising and assisting start-ups.

Jonathan Butters is an experienced product design consultant.

Further Information

We have a page on inventors' resources in North West England on the Inventors Club website

which we shall expand and update as and when we can. We have an Inventors Club group on Linkedin which covers developments affecting inventors throughout the UK. You can of course also join the Inventors Club if you want. The membership rules are here. There is no subscription but we may charge for special services such as showcasing inventions and access to professional services. Anyone who wishes to contact us should call us on 0161 850 0080 or use our online form.

New Angel Network: Ground Floor Ventures Ltd.

2010-11-28T19:35:00.002Z

One of the things about twitter is that you never know who you may meet. Somebody who has just started to follow me is Ground Floor Ventures Ltd.

Ground Floor Ventures is an angel network. On its website it describes itself as follows:

"Ground Floor Ventures is about bringing together entrepreneurs with investors and, unlike other existing 'angel networks', we choose not to charge entrepreneurs to come along and pitch. This means Ground Floor Ventures gets really interesting opportunities that the other events miss out on by pricing out the early stage entrepreneurs. We look for unique businesses which have the potential for serious growth and we aim to attract entrepreneurs looking for a relatively small amount of investment (typically under £30k) so that investors don't have to be 'squillionaires' to reach into their pockets and 'get in on the ground floor' of fabulous business opportunities."

Its next pitching event is on 7 February. If you want to learn more, contact Jack Symons on 07717 171345 or email him on jack@groundfloorventures.co.uk

Online IP Clinic

2010-11-22T07:50:00.003Z

An IP clinic is a free consultation with an intellectual property professional such as a patent or trade mark agent or specialist lawyer. Sometimes you can also see some other professional like a business adviser or marketing consultant.

Since 2005 we have operated walk-in clinics in a number of towns and cities in the North of England with the help of local professionals. Our clinics have been hosted by friends such as Gumption and Bennett Brooks. Clients have been referred to us by other friends such as Bmedia and Business Link Yorkshire.

The North of England, however, is a big place and there is a limit to the number of people we can get to see. We also want to make sure that our clients see the right sort of professional. There is not much point is talking to a product design consultant about a complaint of copyright infringement or a barrister about funding. Also we have had enquiries from people as far apart as Buckinghamshire, Glasgow and South Wales.

So we have decided to put our clinics on line. Inventors and entrepreneurs can now get in touch with us by calling our roll free number, 0800 862 0055, or using our online form. Once they get in touch with us we contact an appropriate expert and ask him or her to give the client 30 minutes or so basic advice. It's all set out in the FAQ on our clinics website.

So what sort of enquiries can we deal with? The answer is: "All sorts." Just like other patent clinics we can introduce you to a patent or trade mark agent who can advise you on patenting or trade mark or design registration. But we also have

barristers and solicitors who can tell you about enforcement, licensing, manufacturing and joint venture agreements
engineers and product design consultants who can talk about prototyping and testing, and
angels and community development finance institutions who can talk about funding.

So, whatever your industry, and whatever your position whether managing director, private inventor, academic or professional adviser, if you need a bit of help from your friends, give us a call.

Son of Business Link: Cable announces new business mentoring network

2010-11-16T14:31:00.003Z

A further indication of what's hoping to replace Business Link emerged yesterday when Business Secretary Vice Cable announced plans for a new single network of mentoring providers. According to the Department's press release, there will be a single online gateway to mentoring from the summer of 2011.

In his speech Cable said

“The best people to advise new entrepreneurs and existing businesses are those who have already started and run successful companies. Mentoring is a very effective way of promoting start-ups, higher productivity and growth amongst established businesses, so I am delighted to announce this new network."

According to Business Matters, mentors will be offered tax breaks for their trouble but they will received no cash as such.

Resources for Inventors in the East Midlands

2010-11-14T13:39:00.006Z

The East Midlands covers the counties of Derbyshire, Leicestershire, Lincolnshire, Northanptonshire, Nottinghamshire and Rutland. According to Wikipedia the region's population is just under 4.2 million and its land area is 15,627 square kilometres. Major towns and cities include Nottingham, Leicester, Derby, Lincoln and Northampton.

Regional Development

The East Midlands Regional Development Agency is the regional development agency for the East Midlands. Proposals for local enterprise partnerships have been accepted for Derby and Derbyshire and Nottingham and Nottinghamshire, Leicester and Leicestershire, Lincolnshire and the South East Midlands.

Inventors Clubs

There does not appear to be an inventors' club in the East Midlands as yet. However, the Sheffield Inventors Group welcomes members from Derbyshire and the Birmingham and Black Country clubs are within comfortable driving distance of most of Leicestershire and Nottinghamshire. Should inventors from the East Midlands wish to set up their own club, we should be glad to help. Call us on 0115 824 9090 or use our online contact form.

Clinics and Libraries

There are no PatLib libraries and hence no CIPA clinics in the East Midlands. However, each of the county and district council library authorities have good on-line and printed business information resources. If anybody from the East Midlands wants advice on any aspect of inventing he or she can contact our clinic using this form. We shall put him or her in touch with a local professional advisor.

Business Advice

Business Link East Midlands is at Innovation House, Riverside Park, Raynesway, Derby, DE21 7BF Tel: 0845 058 6644.

Funding

East Midlands Business Angels Ltd. is the local angel network. There are three community development finance institutions in the region:

Professional Advisers

So far we have one panellist in the East Midlands, the trade mark attorney Mr. Philip Cooper of VeryMark.

There are several well known firms of patent and trade mark attorneys as well as law firms that specialize in intellectual property in the region but we do not yet know any of them well enough to recommend to recommend to private inventors with limited budgets. We advise inventors to shop around and tell us what you find.

Further Information

We have a page on Inventors' Resources in the East Midlands on the Inventors Club website which we shall expand and update as and when we can. We have an Inventors Club group on Linkedinwhich covers developments affecting inventors throughout the UK which you can join. You can of course also join the Inventors Club if you want. The Membership Rules are here. There is no subscription but we may charge for special services such as showcasing inventions and access to professional services. Anyone who wishes to contact us should call us on

0115 824 9090 or use our online contact form

Resources for Inventors in the East of England

2010-11-07T21:32:00.006Z

This is the second of my regional surveys of resources for inventors.

The East of England covers the counties of Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Norfolk and Suffolk. According to Wikipedia the region has a population of 5.39 million in a land area of 19,120 square kilometres. It is home to one of the world's greatest research universities. According to the Intellectual Property Office there were 1,844 patent applications from the region in 2009 placing it third behind South East England and London with 2,777 and 2,752 respectively. Its regional development agency is the East of England Development Agency. Three local enterprise partnership proposals have been accepted from the East of England, namely Greater Cambridge and Greater Peterborough, Hertfordshire and Kent Greater Essex and East Sussex.

Inventors Clubs

I am aware of only one inventor's club in the region. That is CHASE (the Cambridge High Tech Association of Small Enterprises) in Cambridge. The Association meets on the first and third Tuesdays of most months, holds an annual dinner and an occasional conference. Further information can be obtained from Jeff Veil on 01223 721499. I would have expected to find inventors clubs in Bedford, Chelmsford, Colchester, Hatfield, Ipswich, Luton, Norwich and Southend. If inventors in any of those cities want us to help them set up an inventors club they should call us on 01603 343030 or contact us through this form.

Clinics and Libraries

There are no PatLib libraries and hence no CIPA clinics in the East of England. However, each of the county and district council library authorities have good on-line and printed business information resources. If anybody from the East of England wants advice on any aspect of inventing he or she can contact our clinic using this form. We shall put him or her in touch with a local professional advisor.

Business Advice

The HQ of the local Business Link is at Zenith Court in Hatfield. There are local Business Link offices in each of the major towns and cities of the region. Advice and mentoring is also available from Keith McCallum who holds the Business Doctors franchise for Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire.

Funding

Eastern Capital Alliance is a local angel network. There are three community development finance institutions in the region:

Foundation East in Bury St Edmunds; and
NWES and WEETU in Norwich.

Professional Advisers

Further Information

We have a page on Inventors Resources in the East of England on the Inventors Club website which we shall expand and update as and when we can. We have an Inventors Club group on Linkedin which covers developments affecting inventors throughout the UK which you can join. You can of course also join the Inventors Club if you want. The Membership Rules are here. There is no subscription but we may charge for special services such as showcasing inventions and access to professional services. Anyone who wishes to contact us should call us on 01603 343030 or send us an email.

Venturefest: Innovation Showcase, 16 Feb 2011

2010-11-02T16:51:00.004Z

One of the highlights of the Yorkshire business calendar over the last few years has been Venturefest Yorkshire. This is a one day conference and exhibition which takes place at York race course every February brings together Yorkshire business, professions, schools and universities. The next Venturefest takes place on 16 February

One of the best events of the day is the Innovation Showcase. This is an opportunity for up to 30 young high growth companies to compete for a prize worth at least £10,000. Among the advantages of participating in the showcase are a stand worth over £400 and opportunities to meet investors, professional advisers, senior industry specialists and other like minded entrepreneurs,

The business must be in Yorkshire. It must be less than 36 months old. And it must be involved in science, technology or innovation. Application forms can be downloaded here. Further information can be obtained from Anne Salisbury on 07881 505428.

Manchester Inventors Group: 2 Nov 2010 18:00

2010-10-31T14:04:00.004Z

The next Meeting of Manchester Inventors Group will take place at the Becker Room on the 1st floor of the City Library, Elliot House, 151 Deansgate at 18:00 on Tuesday 2 November 2010.

There will be a talk by David Martin titled "Want Business funding?" Mr. Martin is business development manager at Business Finance Solutions which is a community development finance institution ("CDFI"). He will talk about the funding solutions his CDFI offers for innovation, invention and technology, as well as normal businesses that
cannot obtain funding from traditional banks. A not-for-profit, Government-backed initiative, CDFI provide alternative finance for existing and start up businesses in the region, with £950,000 of European Regional Development Funds (ERDF) available to lend to new and existing businesses,
specifically in the technology sector.

As ever this is an opportunity to network with other inventors and talk to support agencies in a safe and confidential environment. If you need any further information about this meeting, do not hesitate to contact Chris Brown on 0161 234 1991.

Government's Strategy on Growth published at last

2010-10-30T01:34:00.011+01:00

The Coalition's long awaited white paper on local growth has now been published and can be downloaded here. It is intended to implement part of the government's strategy to stimulate growth set out in its green paper "A Strategy for Sustainable Growth" published last July.

The Coalition's strategy is very different from that of the outgoing Labour government's which was based on funnelling funds through the Regional Development Agencies and Business Link networks. The new strategy focuses on creating conditions for growth and promises very little money apart from infrastructure improvements and the Regional Growth Fund.

As most of us are used to a more corporatist model, the government's thinking is hard to follow. Those who want to understand the thinking behind it should read the Department for Business Innovation and Skills economic paper "Understanding Local Growth" also published this month. Without an economics background, this paper is hard going, but the important bit is the table on page 10. That shows that productivity per person has actually fallen during the years in which the RDAs existed in every region except London and the South-East and that growth has been appreciably slower outside those regions. That paper taken as a whole has convinced me of the need to try something else.

For most readers of this blog the most important things to mention are local enterprise partnerships ("LEPs") and the Regional Growth Fund ("RGF"): -

LEPs I discussed local enterprise partnerships in my article of 21 Oct "Local Enterprise Partnerships begin to take Shape". In its white paper the government announced that it had accepted 24 of the 62 proposals to establish local enterprise partnerships. These include the proposals from "city regions" like Leeds, Manchester and Sheffield as well as those from predominately rural areas like Cornwall, Cumbria and the Marches. It will be from those local enterprise partnerships and any business support services that they may sponsor that the private inventors, who now look to Business Link and the RDAs, will obtain advice and help on commercializing their inventions in future.
RGF: The money that used to be channelled through the RDAs will now come through the RGF which is now accepting bids (see "Information for Applicants" and the application form guidance). It should be noted that there will be a lot less money about than before and that it will be targeted.

I shall keep readers of this blog informed of developments.

Sheffield Inventors Group

2010-10-29T04:03:00.005+01:00

The next meeting of Sheffield Inventors' Group is on Monday 1 Nov, 18:00 to 19:45.

The guest speaker will be Gail Cherry of Torchlight Coaching, who will be running an interactive session entitled ' Make a commercial opportunity happen'.

Her theme will be: "How the process of business planning helps balance the strong attachment to your invention, to gain focus on the business of getting it to the right people, in the right place, at the right time, for the right price."

As always, the venue for the meeting is

Reference and Information Library
Central Library
Surrey Street
Sheffield
S1 1XZ

Contact Pat Weston on 0114 2734736
Email: information.library@sheffield.gov.uk

Resources for Inventors in North East England

2010-10-26T08:38:00.008+01:00

On 9 September 2010 Mark Prisk, Minister of State for Business and Enterprise, announced a new collaboration between the British Library, NESTA, Newcastle City Library and Northumberland University for a new Business and IP Centre in the City along the lines of the British Library's Business and IP Centre in London (see "Mark Prisk announces new business advisory service" on the Real Business website).

What's There Now?

That announcement prompted me to look at what is available for private inventors in the North East and indeed the rest of the country. As I want to provide a resource for inventors in the North East I should be very grateful if folk from the region could let me know if I have missed anything. They can get in touch with me either through our contact form or on our local number 0191 580 8090.

Inventors' Clubs

First up is that there does not seem to be a local inventors' club in North-East England. I could not find one either through googling, the excellent WRTI's directory of inventors' clubs or any other source. Now there are patent attorneys and patent clinics in the region so there must be inventors, As inventors like to get together there are almost certainly informal gatherings of inventors. But that is not the same thing as a club with regular meeting, networking and mutual assistance. Having helped set up the inventors clubs in Leeds, Liverpool and Sheffield and having supported the ones in Blackburn and Manchester we'd like to help. Again, if any local inventor, patent librarian, business angel, local government officer or entrepreneur would like our help, please let us know.

Clinics

According to the City library website intellectual property advice is available at the City Library in the Charles Avison Building, 33 New Bridge Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 8AX on Wednesday mornings and Friday afternoons. Appointments can be booked through information@newcastle.gov.uk or 0191 227 4100. According to the CIPA website this advice is provided by local patent agents.

Libraries

The City Library at 33 New Bridge Street is a member of the PatLib network and offers lots of printed and on-line resources on all aspects of business law including patent, trade mark and registered design searches for which it charges a fee.

Funding
In addition to national banking, angel and VC networks there are several strong local financial institutions. These include the Entrust business angel network and 4 local community development finance institutions, namely Five Lamps, Northern Pinetree Trust, PNE Group and Street North East.

Regional Development

The Regional Development Agency ("RDA") for the North East England is One North East which, of course, will go the way of the other RDAs very shortly (see "Local Enterprise Partnerships begin to take shape" 21 Oct 2010). There is a regional Business Link based at Spectrum 6, Spectrum Business Park, Seaham, SR7 7TT, Tel: 0845 600 9 006. The RDAs will be replaced by local enterprise partnerships ("LEPs") and proposals have been submitted for County Durham, Northumberland, North Tyneside and the whole North East. Some of these can be accessed from the BIS website.

Professional Advice

There are lots of patent and trade mark agents and some law firms that belong to the Intellectual Property Lawyers Association in Newcastle and other towns and cities in the region. We don't yet know any of them well enough to recommend for private inventors who will have limited budgets and would advise such clients to ask around and shop around and let us know what they find. The same goes for accountants, business advisers, marketing consultants, product designers. We have a page on Inventors Resources for North East England on the Inventors Club website which we will update as and when we can.

Further Information

We have an Inventors Club group on Linkedin which covers developments affecting inventors throughout the UK which you can join. You can of course also join the Inventors Club if you want. The Membership Rules are here. There is no subscription but we may charge for special services such as showcasing inventions and access to professional services.

IP Insurance Five Years On

2010-10-23T20:33:00.000+01:00

Exasperated by the absence of British companies among the top 10 companies that had been granted UK patents between 2004 and 2005 I wrote in September 2005 the article “Why are there no British Names in the Patent Office's Top Ten?” The reason then as now was that the cost of obtaining and enforcing a patent in the UK was beyond the means of most small and medium enterprises. In the article I discussed the ways in which intellectual property infringement litigation could be funded and came to the conclusion that before the event insurance was probably the best option. The very next day I wrote the article “IP Insurance: Does it Work?” and mentioned one instance where it seemed to do so. The next day in this blog I wrote an article especially on “IP Insurance”.

Since 2005 the following developments have taken place:

· S.74A and s.74B of the Patents Act 1977 (providing for advisory opinions by the Intellectual Property Office on patent infringement and validity) have come into force;

· Sir Rupert Jackson has reviewed and reported on Civil Litigation Costs; and

· the Civil Procedure Rules and Practice Directions have been amended to limit costs in Patents County Court actions at £50,000 on liability and £25,000 on quantum which theoretically makes litigation in the Patents County Court only marginally more expensive than in Germany.

The cheapest intellectual property insurance service that I could find in 2005, Intellectual Property Insurance Consultants, is no longer with us but its prime mover Ian Macleod seems to be working now for Alfa Insurance Facilities. Ian Lewis who made Miller into what appeared to be the market leader in this sector in 2005 has founded Samian Underwriting Agency. David Freer, who used to be with HSBC Insurance Consultants, is now a director of Marsh. However, I have also found several new entrants to the market.

Below are the intellectual property insurance services that I have been able to identify. If anyone knows of any broker, underwriter or other intellectual property insurance service provider that I should add to this list, please let me know.

Service Provider	Contact
Abbey Legal Protection	0870 600 1480
Alfa Insurance Facilities	Ian Macleod 01903 23 22 86
Camberford Law	020 8315 5066
Charles Milnes & Co.	020 7923 4655
Marsh Brokers Ltd.	David Freer 07770 740237
McParland Finn Ltd.	Mark Philimore 0113 366 2369
Miller Insurance	020 7031 2819
Professional Insurance Agents Ltd.	01323 648000
Samian Underwriting Agency	Ian Lewis 020 7954 4430
Temple Legal Protection	01483 577877

Local Enterprise Partnerships begin to take Shape

2010-10-21T00:06:00.009+01:00

At their meeting at Bradford on 29 June 2010. the Cabinet resolved to abolish the Regional Development Agencies ("RDAs") and replace them with Local Enterprise Partnerships ("LEPs").

The Ministers' Letter

That same day Dr. Vince Cable, the President of the Board of Trade etc, and Mr. Eric Pickles, the Secretary of State for Communities, sent a letter to local government and business leaders inviting them to arrange for local groups of councils and business leaders to come together to develop proposals for such LEPs.

LEPs' Powers

It is clear from the ministers' letter that these new LEPs can be nothing like as powerful as the RDAs they are intended to replace. For a start, attracting inward investment, sector leadership, business support and innovation and access to funds are to be handled nationally while regional strategy is to be abandoned altogether. The new partnerships will be left with such weighty matters as planning, housing, local infrastructure and business startups. The letter envisaged equal representation for local government and business on the governing bodies and that those organs would usually be chaired by a prominent local businessman.

Deadlines Missed and Kept

Dr. Cable and Mr. Pickles promised a white paper on "sub-national" (the adjective "sub-national" apparently being Newspeak for "regional") growth by the summer. As it is now October that has clearly not happened Even though the government has missed its own deadline it insisted on submissions from local authority and business syndicates by 6 September. This was a very tight deadline slightly over 2 months from the original letter that appears to have taken no account of annual holidays.

Proposals Received So Far

Remarkably, nearly 60 proposals were received by that deadline. Some of these have been published on the grandiloquently named Department for Business, Innovation and Skills's ("BIS") website. If the ministers had seriously hoped that groups of local authorities and businesses would get together, they must be disappointed. For the Greater Newcastle conurbation there have been no less than 4 separate proposals from Northumberland and North Tyneside, Newcastle and Gateshead, South Tyneside and Sunderland and County Durham. Several proposals cover the same area: the Greater Manchester metropolitan authorities and the Peel Group have both submitted proposals for Manchester and there are separate proposals for the Gatwick Diamond and the "Brighton and Hove, Croydon, the Gatwick Diamond and West Sussex - Coast to Capital" project. Instead of local collaboration the proposals appear to show a revival of local rivalries.

Funding

Some clues as to funding that may be available after the dismantling of the RDAs come from two consultation papers which BIS did get round to publishing over the summer:

a green paper on a £1 billion regional growth fund announced by the Cabinet in Bradford "to encourage private sector enterprise, including social enterprise, and capacity, and in doing so create opportunities for people and places to adjust to reductions in public spending"; and
"Financing a Private Sector Recovery" (Cm 7923) a consultation on access to funding in the private sector.

It is clear from those consultation documents that only money that could be available to the LEPs will be the regional growth fund. My initial view is that £1 billion spread over 8 of the 9 regions of England is not very much. Such a sum is unlikely to create much opportunity in places where there are likely to be massive public expenditure cuts.

Local Business Advice

One of the first casualties of the abolition of the RDAs are likely to be local and regionalBusiness Link services. In an interview with Jason Hesse on the Real Business website, Mark Prisk, the Business Minister, announced:

“We’re going to wind down the Regional Development Agencies, and as part of those, we’ll be winding down the regional Business Link contracts.”

These will be replaced by a state funded online service - presumably the existing Business Link website possibly under the "Solutions for Business" brand - and greater use of existing service providers such as chambers of commerce and local authorities. The proposal for a new business information service to be provided by thee British Library, NESTA, Newcastle City Council and Northumbria University is probably something like the model Mr. Prisk had in mind (see "Mark Prisk announces new business advisory service" on the Real Business website).

Enforce a Confidentiality Agreement for as Little as £475

2010-08-21T12:26:00.002+01:00

Most inventors learn from the Intellectual Property Office (“IPO”), librarians, Business Link advisors, patent attorneys and each other that they should disclose their inventions only in confidence. They know that they should ask business partners, investors and others to sign instruments like the IPO’s “Confidential Disclosure Agreement”.

But what happens if a person who has signed one of those agreements breaks his or her promises by making the invention or disclosing it to a third party? Theoretically the inventor can claim an injunction, damages or other relief for breach of confidence. If he or she acts quickly enough, the inventor can apply to the court for an injunction to restrain the breach until trial. But an application of that kind can cost thousands of pounds. There are not very many individuals or indeed businesses with that kind of money.

Before the Access to Justice Act 1999 legal aid was available for that kind of action. Unfortunately para.1 (h) of Sched. 2 of that Act now excludes business disputes from legal aid. Many unscrupulous opportunists are aware that civil litigation is not an option for their victims if they disregard their obligations.

However, civil litigation is not the only means of enforcement. Parties to an agreement can agree to refer any dispute or difference arising from their agreement to a tribunal of their choice known as an “arbitrator” who will determine the dispute in accordance with the law and evidence in much the same way as a judge would though in private and at a time and place of the parties’ choosing. That is a process known as “arbitration”. It is one of several alternatives to the courts that are bundled together under the label “alternative dispute resolution” or ADR.

There are many types of dispute for which arbitration is more appropriate than litigation. If a case turns on a technical issue as happens frequently in civil engineering, the issue is more likely to be understood by an arbitrator who has spent his lifetime in that profession than by a judge who has spent his in the criminal or divorce courts. If the parties are from different countries and neither is comfortable with the legal system of the other they can refer their dispute to a neutral that they both trust. Yet another type of case appropriate for arbitration are disputes between trade mark owners and proprietors of domain names that are the same or similar to the mark as to who should own the domain name. The parties to such disputes need a process that is fast and fair but also inexpensive. Procedures like the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (“UDRP”) deliver a binding decision within a few weeks of the complaint for as little as US$1,500.

There is no reason why a process like the UDRP should not be used to resolve other types of intellectual property dispute such as those that subsist between inventors and their collaborators, investors, licensees and other third parties. NIPC Ltd has established such a process called NIPC Arbitration. This is “a low cost dispute resolution service for intellectual property, technology, media and entertainment cases” inspired by the UDRP and similar schemes. NIPC Arbitration can deliver an order to refrain from breaching a promise not to use or disclose confidential information within a few days of the reference for as little as £475 (£250 to the arbitrator for a telephone hearing lasting less than an hour plus £100 to the company for registration, another £25 for appointing the arbitrator and £100 for arranging the hearing). Rule 5 of the scheme’s Arbitration Rules confers on the arbitrator all the powers of the court including the power to grant interim injunctions. The risk to the inventor is limited by rule 11 (4) which limits costs to those that would be awarded by a hearing officer in an Intellectual Property Office tribunal which very rarely exceed £3,000 and are usually much lower. An award by an arbitrator is as good as a judgment for most purposes and can be backed up if necessary by the courts.

NIPC Arbitration is by no means the only arbitration scheme but it is the only one that is tailored to IP disputes involving individual inventors, start-ups and other small businesses. Key to the scheme is an arbitration clause which refers disputes to an NIPC arbitrator under the NIPC Arbitration Rules. Examples of such clauses are to be found on the Arbitration Agreement Page of the NIPC website.

For more information fill in the on-line contact form or visit www.nipcarb.co.uk .

Keeping the sharks at bay

2010-08-21T10:56:00.001+01:00

Check out this SlideShare Presentation:

Keeping the sharks at bay

View more presentations from Jane Lambert.

Leeds Inventors’ Club: 21 July 2010

2010-07-23T10:00:00.001+01:00

On Wednesday I gave a talk to Leeds Inventors’ Club entitled “Keeping the Sharks at Bay: Resolving Disputes between Co-Inventors, Licensees, Investors and Third Parties”. In it I took four typical case histories which had given rise to difficulties for individual inventors and suggested some remedies. In other words, turning shark into delicious shark’s fin soup. I have amended the slides to take account of the site’s format and posted them toSlideshare.

NIPC Clinics go nationwide

2009-06-01T11:47:00.004+01:00

Ever since February 2005 Jane Lambert has provided 30 minutes of her time to up to 4 members of the public on the last day of every month absolutely fee of charge. She calls these advice sessions "clinics" and you can get some idea of what goes on at these sessions from the clinics website at www.nipc-clinics.co.uk or from her post "Tales of the Patent Clinic" on the IP Yorkshire blog. These clinics have proved very popular and Jane has responded to requests to open others elsewhere. She now has 8 of them in Barnsley, Bradford, Halifax, Huddersfield, Leeds, Rotherham and York in Yorkshire and another at Bromborough in the Wirral.

That is as much as any one woman can manage and we have reluctantly had to turn down requests to extend that network until now. However, from 1 October NIPC clinics will go nationwide. Inventors or business people can fill in a form online or call one number which will enable us to identify the problem and identify who is best suited to help resolve it. We will then arrange for the client to meet a local professional well suited to assist him who may be a barrister, solicitor, patent attorney, trade mark attorney or a member of some other profession. The professional will give the client up to 30 minutes of his or her time absolutely free.

All the professionals in Yorkshire and the North-West who have participated in our programme have picked up work through the clinic. We are therefore about to recruit solicitors, patent and trade mark attorneys, accountants, business and other advisors throughout the country to assist us.

Rocky Mountains Inventors' Association

2009-05-08T20:19:00.003+01:00

One of the delights of travelling through the New World is finding little bits of home beyond home. For example, when I was a graduate student at UCLA in the early 1970s there was "Ye Mucky Duck" and "The Brigadoon" whenever I felt homesick. Near Boone, North Carolina there was a village called Tynecastle where they actually held highland games. In Victoria, British Columbia they play cricket and replicate Anne Hathaway's cottage - complete with her husband's second best bed. In Trelew, Argentina there's a "Canolfan Dewi Sant" right in the town centre.

And if any of our us from the land of Newton, Brunel, Darby, Crick, Stephenson. Farraday, Jenner, Whittle, Babbage, Turing, Berners-Lee, Swan, Watt, Trevithick, Dunlop, Shaw, Logie Baird and Cockerell ever stray into Colorado we'll find like minded souls at the Rocky Mountain Inventors Association. The mission of the Association is almost identical to that of the clubs in Leeds, Liverpool and Sheffield:

"The mission of The Rocky Mountain Inventors Association (RMIA) is to promote successful product commercialization and protection by offering information, education, and guidance including business contacts and networking opportunities."

Like us it has inventor and service provider members. I learned about the Association from one of those service providers, Kevin Houchin, since we follow each other on "twitter.".

The activities of the Colorado inventors are remarkably like those of the Northern Clubs. They have regular talks by folk like Kevin. Yesterday, for example, he was talking about trade marks and domain names which gives me an idea for what to do in Sheffield on Monday. Maybe we can make use of the Internet to link together with Kevin telling us about protecting and promoting innovation in America and maybe some of us telling our American colleagues about what happens here.

Investing wisely in IP - my 6-Point Plan for any Business

2009-03-26T07:31:00.005Z

A patent, copyright, trade mark, registered design or other IP right is nothing more than a right to bring a law suit. Its purpose is to protect the income generated by an intellectual asset, that is to say, a brand, design, technology or creative work. Such protection does not come cheap. According to research commissioned by the EPO, it costs €32,000 to obtain a typical European patent and maintain it for 10 years. That is an awful lot of money to spend considering that most patents are never worked. Enforcement is even more expensive. IPAC (HM government’s high level advisory committee on intellectual property) estimates that a patent infringement action costs £1 million in the High Court. That explains why I have seen far more businesses fail from having too much IP than from having too little in my 32 years at the English bar.

Yet there are circumstances in which a business needs to protect its investment in branding, design, technology or creative works. How does a businessman or woman recognize such circumstances and how does he or she choose the optimum legal protection. Here is a simple 6-point plan that can apply to just about any business.

1. Choose a period in which you expect your business to develop. This can be any period of your choosing which will probably depend on the nature of your business and products and services. For a company in the fashion or novelties business this could be a matter of months or even weeks. For a pharmaceutical company it could be decades.

2. Identify the main income streams that you expect to develop in that period. IP is intended to protect income streams, If your invention is never going to earn money whether directly or indirectkly through sale or licensing why waste thousands of pounds on patenting it? Similarly, if you have no sales in country X and are never likely to have any why seek intellectual property proteciton there? You may want tpo protect yourself in country X it it has a sufficient industrial base to allow a competitor to set up there but, if not, why bother?

3. Consider potential threats to each of those income streams. Competition from competing products or services may be one but there may be others such as changing patterns of demand or the general economic situation.

4. List possible counter-measures to those threats. Most of these will be commercial rather than legal such as cutting your prices or developing new products or services but for some threats such as plagiarism you may actually need some legal protection such as a patent or design registration.

5. If any of those counter-measurers is an IP right, choose the most appropriate one for your business. There is usually a choice. For instance, one way of protecting a new product or process is simply to keep it under wraps and seek to rely on the law of confidence to prevent unauthorized use or disclosure. The other is to proclaim it to the world in exchange for a temporary monopoly of the manufacture, sale and use of the product or use of the process (otherwise known as a “patent”). Where the technology has only a short shelf-life, a 20-year monopoly is otiose. On the other hand, if you are a drug company which has invested millions in R & D in a new product and waited years for approval from drug licensing authorities you need patent protection in every country of the world of you are to see an adequate return on your investment.

6. Ensure that there is adequate funding for enforcement proceedings. Unless you can afford hundreds of thousands of pounds on litigation and can risk at least as much again if you lose your case with equanimity you should think of IP insurance. Though these articles need to be updated you can start with two articles that I wrote in September 2005: “IP Insurance. Does it Work” (IP/IT Update) and “IP Insurance” (NIPC Inventors Club).

These and other tips are all set out in my presentation to Leeds Inventors Club “So you think you want a Patent?” which I gave on 18 April 2008. I also discuss them in my book “Enforcing Intellectual property Rights” which appeared earlier this month.

Sheffield Inventors Club, 2 March 2009, 18:00

2009-03-02T01:12:00.003Z

Just a reminder of the meeting of the Sheffield Inventors' Club on Monday 2 March at 18:00..

Prof Ron Jones will give the talk on how to bring your invention to market that he was prevented form giving last month by the weather.

The meeting will take place at Central Library, Surrey Street, Sheffield as usual.

IP Strategy: IP Asset Maximizer Blog

2009-02-17T01:13:00.006Z

Over the 30 plus years that I have been at the English Bar I have seen far more businesses ruined by acquiring too much IP than too little. That is particularly true of private inventors who apply for the most extensive patent, design and trade mark protection around the world long before they know whether they will ever sell a single product.

I have no reason to believe that patent agents act from anything but the purest motives and professionalism when they advise their clients of the narrow geographical extent of a British patent and "the inconvenient truth" (to quote a former US Veep) that the invention is made available to everyone in the world including persons skilled in the art way beyond the boundaries of the country for which the patent is granted. When asked what can be done in say France to prevent then infringement of a British patent the answer is of course nothing. The remedy is to get a grant for France, and then the rest of the industrial world until the client has spent his entire life savings.

And what does the client have to show for all that expense? Unless he has an income stream to protect and the wherewithal to protect it, NOT A LOT. Inventors have to be reminded that it costs €30,500 to maintain a typical European patent in 5 countries for 10 years and that most inventions are never worked. For them the Office fees, patent attorneys' charges, their disbursements and other expenses is MONEY DROWN THE DRAIN.

When I tell my inventors that at my IP Clinics or inventors' clubs they refuse to believe it because that is contrary to what they are told by patent agents, Business Link and each other. Imagine my delight, then, at encountering a blog that is devoted to IP strategy. Jackie Hutter's blog IP Asset Management is exactly that. Packed to gunnels with good articles it is. Here are some examples:

Ms Hutter, who lives in Decatur, Georgia in the USA appears to know what she is talking about. She has 13 years experience in advising companies, investors and universities on how to maximize intangible asset value by developing and executing on IP and patent strategy.

The URL of this lady's blog is at http://www.ipassetmaximizer.com/ and one can follow her on twitter at http://twitter.com/IPStrategist if one does not have anything better to do than look out for banalities (though never from Ms Hutter) in 140 letters or less. Talking of twitter, my thanks to @jefflindsay for bringing this blog to my attention.

The Downturn may be the Best Time to commercialize your Invention

2009-01-15T20:32:00.010Z

Since October I have been making the rounds of the Northern inventors' clubs with my presentation, "The Coming Economic Downturn: How it will affect Inventors and what they can do". My message is necessarily gloomy but I try to finish on a high note that an economic downturn is often the best time to start a business. There are a number of reasons for this. Costs are low. Governments tend to prime pumps. At a time when most businesses are shedding labour rather than recruiting most entrepreneurs have much less to lose.

That message is usually received scepticlly so I was heartened considerably by Sanjiv Buttoo's feature on the BBC website "Business brains urged to take the plunge". The article features an interview with Ajaz Ahmed who started Freeserve in 1998. When the service was launched, most homes in the UK connected to the Internet through an 0845 number for which they were charge local calls on top of an annual or monthly subscription to their Internet service provider. The idea behind Freeserve was to take a share of the charge for the telephone call rather than charge a subscription. This simply proposition proved extremely popular with the result that Freeserve became the biggest ISP in Britain. Its growth attracted the attention of the French giant Wanadoo which is a subsidiary of the French national telephone company. Freeserve merged with Wanadoo giving Ajaz a very substantial share of the merged company.

The reason I happen to know all this is that Ajaz is a local lad and he is involved with a number of institutions with which I am also interested. There include the Media Centre where our chambers are based and the University with which we have worked. The article begins with the words:

"Budding entrepreneurs should take advantage of the current economic downturn and take the plunge, a self-made millionaire from West Yorkshire is urging."

"Exactly the message I have been putting about in my presentation," I thought to myself. "If the inventors won't take it from me maybe they will take it from someone who has actually made his fortune and at a fairly young age."

The articles continues with the following admonition from Ajaz that despite the downturn in the economy, now is the time make money

"You can negotiate a good deal on renting a shop or unit, hiring staff, advertising or even buying cheaper raw materials
Now is the time to start up with minimal costs, but you need to have that idea or you're wasting your time."

Exactly! The article continued with some examples of people in and around Huddersfield who were actually doing this. Mohammed Ramzan who is also in the Media Centre and even more impressively a couple of schoolboys from Elland who seem to making serious money from publishing their own magazine.

If any reader wants to take not my advice but Amjad's he or she will get a lot of help. Not just from me but from the patent and trade mark agents, solicitors, accountants, marketers, product designers and other experts on my IP Yorkshire panel if they happen to live in Yorkshire. You can access their expertise in many ways, through the Leeds and Sheffield inventors clubs and the clinics in Barrnsley, Bradford, Halifax, Huddersfield, Leeds and Rotherham.

If you don't live in Yorkshire, don't worry. I am setting up similar networks in other regions starting with the North West so we shall soon be able to help you wherever you live. Ajaz emailed me yesterday when I said I liked his sentiments:

"in all this doom and gloom there are opportunities for the brave one, lets hope we see success stories emerging from this sad period."

Let's make sure that happens.

A Very Sad Tale Indeed: Forrester Ketley & Co v Brent

2009-01-14T00:27:00.007Z

In Forrester Ketley & Co v Brent [2008] EWHC 3150 (Ch) (19 Dec 2008) Mr. Justice Morgan had to deal with no less than 53 applications for permission to litigate in all sorts of matters including petitions for his bankruptcy and charging orders over his home.

The reason the applicant needed permission to litigate is that he had been subject to a series of civil restraint orders that required him to apply for permission to the court before going to law. Those orders had been imposed because he had attempted in previous proceedings to join the Crown, the Department for Constitutional Affairs (as the Ministry of Justice was then called), the Lord Chancellor, various judges, and the entire partnership of his opponent's solicitors and had embarked on satellite litigation seeking criminal sanctions against the High Court, the Court of Appeal, various members of the Court of Appeal, and the Health and Safety Executive. He had also tried to sue the UK government, the other side's solicitors and PAMIA in the European Court of Human Rights. All this derived from a claim in 1994 for fees of £4,400 by a firm of patent attorneys and a counterclaim of £5,000 for alleged overpayment and negligence which spawned 100 pages of pleadings by the time it was struck out by the Patents Court in 2003.

This exceedingly sad case would seem incredible to most folk but it is sadly believable to anyone who has ever worked with private inventors. The brilliance of the bright idea and the lure of riches beyond the dreams of Croesus beguile to the extent that some become obsessed with their invention and a few even unhinged. Charles Dickens knew of this tendency and wrote about it in his novels and short stories. The conditions seems to begin with unfounded optimism: "I've checked round B & Q and can find nothing like it on their shelves" or "sales of trundle humpers amounted to umpteen billion pounds last year and I only have to sell 1% to make so many millions."

In the first few pages of "A Better Mousetrap, The Business of Invention" Peter Bissell and Graham Barker warn that the vast majority of patents are never worked, that most of those that are do little more than cover their costs and only a tiny percentage of the rest ever make serious money.

More from NZ:The T-Shirt Marketer's Guide to World Domination

2008-12-05T08:36:00.003Z

Last week I blogged the patent application of Ryan Nicholls a 9-year old from NZ who has applied for a patent for an ingenious waste separator. Now I have something else to mention from NZ.

My friend, Amanda Lennon, who used to run the Huddersfield Business Mine and Velocity Bradford, now manages the Canterbury Innovation Manager in Christchurch New Zealand. Amanada and her team have just produced a short video entitled "The T-Shirt Marketer's Guide to World Domination" which you can view on YouTube. This film explains very simply and also very cleverly the process of innovaiton and commercialization. Though made from a NZ perspective it is relevant everywhere..

Catching 'em Young

2008-11-29T07:12:00.004Z

Ryan Nicholls, a 9 year old New Zealand child, has become his country's (and possibly the world's) youngest patent applicant. (see Michelle Lotter, Patent pending for young inventor, North Shore Times, 29 Nov 2009 on Stuff.co.nz with thanks to Matthew Buchanan of "Promote the Progress blog" for bringing this story to my attention). Does anybody know of a younger patent applicant anywhere else in the world? My interest in science and technology developed at about that age. I never made an invention - much less applied for a patent - but I do remember helping to make a primitive computer using telephone exchange switches (this was in the 1960s) together with several other children and under a teacher's supervision when I was a bit older. So heartiest congratulations to young Ryan from England.

Ryan's invention appears to be a device for separating moisture from food scraps in domestic waste disposal systems. The scraps are removed to a container where they are aerated and eventually form a compost. According to the report, Ryan was fed up with taking out the compost, so he invented a machine that would do it automatically.

Considering its tiny population and remoteness, NZ has contributed more than most countries to science and technology. Ernest Rutherford, of course, but also the inventors of disposable syringes, aerial top dressing and bungee jumping to name just a few.

Rutherford did his best work in Manchester. Manchester Inventors Group (the average age of which is somewhat greater than 9) has set up a working party to "make the most of their creative and innovative skills". One of its proposals is a competition similar to the one that Ryan won at home. Should Ryan follow the footsteps of his illustrious compatriot to one of the world's greatest universities he should find a lot of like minded contemporaries with whom to compete and collaborate.

New IP Clinic at Rotherham

2008-11-25T13:35:00.002Z

We are delighted to announce a new IP clinic at Catcliffe near Rotherham. We also have a new clinics website at www.nipc-clinics.co.uk providing a calendar and online booking form to make it easier to secure a slot.

We also have a new website for our training company at www.nipc-training.co.uk which will hold workshops that are likely to interest inventors, thier investors and professional advisors.

How will the Economic Downturn affect Inventors

2008-10-16T10:11:00.004+01:00

I spoke on this topic to the Leeds Inventors Club last night and have uploaded my slides to my Slideshare page.

I warned that the coming downturn is likely to be deeper and more prolonged than others in recent years because there will be less scope for interest rate cuts and public expenditure. Inventors in the UK are likely to be affected by falling demand, reduced grant and loan funding, reduced credit, caution on the part of angels, VCs and other investors, rising costs at least in the long term and increasing competition from the BRICs states (Brazil, Russia, India and China).

However, growth in the BRICs states will provide opportunities. Until now we have looked to those countries to outsource manufacturing and services. Those countries are also fast growing markets, powerhouses of research and development and increasingly they will be a source of investment for business in the UK.

There will also be opportunities here. We shall still need to save energy and protect the environment. There will be plenty of demand for innovation in energy conservation, renewables and, of course, the Internet as it continues to develop and expand. I reminded the audience that 1930s, the decade of the worst economic downturn in recent history, was also an age of innovation producing all sorts of important inventions from ballpoint pens and sellotape to jet engines and radar.

Economic difficulties are likely to make invention promoters that much more tempting. They are to be avoided like the plague. Stephen Nipper has started a discussion on what to do about these people on his blog ("Counseling (sic) Victims of Invention Promotion Companies" 15 Oct 2008).

Sheffield Inventors Club: Eric Redfern "An Inventor's Alternative Route to Market"

2007-02-04T23:22:00.000Z

In the first few pages of their excellent book "The Business of Invention" , Peter Bissell and Graham Barker set out some bleak statistics. Most bright ideas fail to get off the drawing board. The vast bulk of the patents registered in the UK Patent Office are never worked. Of the very few inventions that are made, only a fraction cover their costs. Out of that tiny residue only a very small number actually make any money for their inventor.

Finding a successful inventor is therefore as rare as finding a four leaf clover or an NHS dentist. There are a few spectacularly successful American ones like Jerome Lemelson but hardly any British ones. One of the few British inventors who can be described as successful is Eric Redfern. Eric is one of the most prolific inventors I have ever come across. He has come up with earth leak devices, a hands free dryer, a date rape analyser, balloon vending machine and much, much more.

Eric thinks big but he is very practical. When he has a bright idea he approaches the big boys like major firms of accountants and solicitors for introductions to clients who are likely to help him. He gets them to work on a contingency basis. He also keeps his friends as he does not look to them to invest in his projects.

I first heard Eric at Manchester Inventors' Club in October and was so impressed that I choked him for the Leeds and Liverpool Clubs where he was equally well received. Now he is coming to Sheffield Inventors' Club at Central Library, Surrey Street on 5 Feb 2006 at 18:00. Do come along to hear him. You have a real treat in store.

US Patent and Trademark Office Inventors' Resources Site

2006-06-29T11:40:00.000+01:00

A resource that other patent offices around the world would do well to emulate is the "Inventor Resources" page on the USPTO (US Patent and Trademark Office) website. That is a web page designed specifically for independent inventors.

The welcome page explains that "the innovation and dedication of independent inventors have played a critical role in the USA's evolution into the most technologically advanced, economically vibrant power on earth". It continues that ever since it was founded in 1802, the USPTO has been dedicated to assisting independent inventors in utilizing America’s intellectual property system. A new comprehensive Inventor Assistance Program has been launched to expand the scope of services provided to independent inventors to make sure that they receive appropriate attention.

Information on patents includes:

There is also similar information on trade marks:

Though US law is different in some respects a lot of the information on both patents (which includes what we would call registered designs) would apply here too.

The site also contains plenty of good brochures some of which apply here. The excellent little card entitled "Scam Prevention" definitely does. Another really good feature that others could copy is a chat room for advice and many of the transcripts are published. An example of the latest one follows here. There is a lot of other good stuff such as whether to hire a patent attorney, funding and special inventors' events. Good stuff nephew Sam.

"The Innovators' Toolkit", Lancaster University 3 Aug 2006

2006-06-28T01:08:00.000+01:00

I am honoured to have been invited to speak at “The Innovators Toolkit” a workshop to be held at Info Lab 21 at the University of Lancaster on 3 August, 2006 between 09.15 and 12.30.

“The Innovators Toolkit” is targeted at SMEs and organisations that assist them. The workshop gives a compact but tailored overview of the ways that innovation is best protected and managed in order to rank amongst the tangible assets of a company and to illustrate just how much more an enterprise can do itself to minimize the costs associated with the protection of intellectual property.
Topics include obtaining a patent, registration of designs and unregistered design rights, copyright, managing innovation and enforcement.

The main speaker is Dr. Ron Jones who has spent that past 25 years as an inventor/entrepreneur in his own SME and has successfully licensed technology to global corporations and seen these inventions reach a high level of commercial success. In addition to his entrepreneurship Ron holds a Master of Laws from the Edinburgh Law School in Innovation Technology and Law. I shall be talking about enforcement and ADR.

The course is organized by "ip.com" which has recently opened up in the UK and further information can be obtained from Ron at rjones@ip.com. There will be a charge of £30 top attend the workshop.

Liverpool Inventors Club: I've got a Great Idea - How not to Spoil It

2006-05-31T00:59:00.000+01:00

I have uploaded the slides of my talk to Liverpool Inventors Club at the end of last month. Late, I know but I hope you will find they are worth it. It was a good meeting with a lot of networking. The club us definitely gelling.

The next meeting will be on 26 June. Jo Pritchard of Liverpool John Moores and Jonathan Butters of JAB Design will discuss ways of bringing new products to market. They will discuss all the local services available and how they all come together.

I am very conscious that I have not put up a great deal of stuff this month. It has been a very full month for me working hard for you inventors. There are some really exciting local services in the pipeline including in particular the IPCEX IP pro bono clinic which will open in Manchester next month and the Huddersfield and Bradford inventors' clinics on 5 July. Will keep you all posted.

IP Audits: Tips from Downunder

2006-04-28T18:09:00.000+01:00

Advice that I give constantly to my clients is to carry out an intellectual property audit (see, for instance, "Acquiring Intellectual Property" on our chambers website). But what is an IP Audit and how do you carry one out. Ian Cockburn, a patent agent from Aotearoa (aka NZ), has the answer in "IP Audit – A “How to” Guide". Ian gives us a worked example of a typical SME. There are other ways of approaching the task but this is certainly one way.

Ian's article appears in the WIPO SME Newsletter together with an article by one Aswath Damodaran of Stern School of Business on valuing brand names, flexibilities and patents which complements Ian's article in several ways and an article by a whole warren of worthy US patent lawyers on when to patent and when to rely on trade secrets.