IP Audits

Almost every business should have regular IP Audits. This is especially important for industries that devote a substantial amount to R&D expenditures. An IP audit can identify assets or potential liabilities in current procedures and practices of a company. If a company waits until it faces litigation before gathering its intellectual property rights, it is often too little too late. What type of intellectual property rights a company has may include patents, patentable subject matter, trade secrets, such as customer lists or procedures that add value to a business, trademarks, copyrights, and trade dress. An IP audit will reveal the type and quality of intellectual property rights and protections that may be available to a company. Equally important, an IP audit may discover hidden treasures – intellectual assets that are ripe for protection to add value to the company.

If your company is US-based, the audit can focus on the federal and state intellectual property rights available to you. If your company has foreign markets, then a global IP strategy and audit may be more fruitful. One of the founding partners of Altera Law Group, Michael Lasky, an intellectual property lawyer and patent attorney, routinely crosses the Atlantic to address the needs of his clients in Europe. Mr. Lasky speaks several foreign languages, and has lived in Europe.

Experienced IP counsel can help you select the types of intellectual property protection best suited for your company. If patents are involved, you will want to ensure that a patent attorney undertakes at least that part of the audit. Altera’s patent attorneys also have experience with other forms of intellectual property including trademarks, trade secrets, and copyrights. One of Altera’s trademark attorneys focuses almost exclusively on this area of law in the US and abroad.

Altera Law Group is willing to work with your company to guide it through the turbulent IP waters, and help reinforce shelters for your intellectual property. Our attorneys take pride in their work, and an IP audit is a good way for a new client to evaluate our differences.