Mathys & Squire has grown an enviable reputation in handling major patent and trade mark portfolios for some of the world’s largest organisations. With this responsibility comes the need to create systems that work for each of these clients. We have implemented bespoke IT, billing and reporting procedures to meet specific demands. We have also implemented processes and systems to handle volume caseloads for the same client.
Members of our firm have been seconded into these organisations to better understand their processes and strengthen our relationships. We work closely with both in-house teams and foreign attorney firms, in some cases, across the globe. This understanding has also allowed us to commercialise valuable IP and we have been involved with a number of lucrative licensing deals.
Our teams work with these clients across all areas of technology in both patent and trade mark and we frequently represent their interests in oppositions and appeals before the European Patent Office and OHIM.
Our experience with clients of this size has created a flexible approach to accommodate their individual needs, whether this involves working with an in-house team to create a specific reporting process, or an introduction to another inventor with a proposal to augment their offering.
Being an active part of the startup and SME community is important to us. Many of our clients do not have in-house IP expertise and we work alongside them to advise on the best course of action, that will make the most commercial sense.
Understanding the value of a potential innovation or a brand is as important as understanding the technology or marketing behind it, and our thorough analysis will not necessarily always recommend proceeding with protection. We will never take a client and simply charge them for something that they may not need. Clients in this space value our honesty and we are well-known for the robust and practical advice that we give.
As companies grow, we will continue to advise on their portfolio and ensure that further protection is taken if required. Working with many other suppliers in this space has given us a network of relevant contacts and we regularly work with clients to facilitate valuation and finance based on their IP.
Our experience of due diligence projects in this space is highly regarded and we work with a number of leading law firms on M&A and exit planning strategy. Our understanding of large corporations has also given us a great deal of experience working on licensing deals and JVs. We have worked with a number of SMEs to successfully ‘find a home’ for a particular product or a brand.
Mathys & Squire also offers support to the SME community on our Scaleup Quarter page, a one-stop microsite focused on smaller and growing businesses, including startups and scaleups, to harness their passion and energy for innovation and provide crucial IP services that are dynamic and energetic, adding value and supporting businesses as they grow.
Making the most of Patent Box and R&D tax credits is also an area where we are active. Many SME sized clients are unaware of the tax relief that is available to them, and have not taken advantage of the various grants and schemes supported by the UK Government. We take our role in this community seriously and are currently working on a number of projects to raise awareness of the value of IP for smaller sized businesses, across all sectors.
Our dedicated utilities group combines specialist industry insight of both private and public sector clients with expertise across all technical areas, working across all areas of supply.
Work in the sector covers a diverse range of technologies on projects ranging from the search for licensing prospects through to complex litigation as a result of new legislation.
Our team manages the entire trade mark portfolios for the UK’s largest energy and home services company and the UK’s largest listed water company. The group also works with a number of suppliers to the industry, which has enabled us to develop a full understanding of the importance of supply chain.
We offer our clients a complete range of IP services, including evaluation of IP opportunities, global filing and prosecution strategy, drafting, prosecution, opposition, validity, freedom-to-operate, competitor monitoring, and licensing.
Whether your needs for our attorneys fall under utilities patenting and trademarking, or another of our specialist sectors – you are in the right hands. As a leading full-service IP law firm, our offices and expertise stretch from London to Paris and beyond. We have offices in the UK, France, Germany and Luxembourg – we want to become part of your success story, so contact us today.
As a firm, we have long-standing relationships with many public body clients, including some in the Higher Education (HE) sector, including Imperial College, Queen’s University Belfast, Oxford University Innovations, Cambridge Enterprise, and have more recently been appointed representative for the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
We understand that there are a number of challenges related to IP that are unique to the public HE sectors, especially with regards to rapid filing when a paper is to be published or presented. We regularly attend urgent meetings with inventors to discuss inventions where disclosure is imminent and a patent filing must be made at very short notice.
We can also provide guidance as to potential novelty and inventive step in light of the known prior art. For leading academics often this prior art originates from their own research, and we are experts in devising filing strategies to maximise opportunities for protection even over the inventors’ own publications (and even inadvertent disclosures).
We have experience in advising on licence negotiations between public sector organisation, universities and third parties as part of the commercialisation process. Our team is able to provide sufficient “bandwidth”, providing the flexibility and capacity to allow any work to be undertaken at the right level, and achieve economic savings. It also enables us to handle complex or large volumes of work, even on an urgent basis.
Our experience ensures that the correct strategy is adopted for each matter and that you are advised fully on the action to be taken, the commerciality of that course of action and the likely timescales and within the capped costs of your stated priority level.