1. Introduction

For the development of enterprises, the ultimate value of intellectual property lies in competition. Intellectual property management should not just be patent checking and applying. In order to achieve sustained and benign development, enterprises should carry out the overall planning of intellectual property rights from a forward-looking perspective while fully consider the trend and direction of their own intellectual property development in accordance with the business strategy, models, core competitiveness, resource allocation, innovative R&D capabilities, and actual market competition needs. They should also deeply understand the competition pattern and development trend under the new situation by studying and analyzing the intellectual property information, and take them as an important basis for their development strategy.

As being employed in two enterprises, the author would like to share some experience, indicating that the intellectual property management personnel should formulate different intellectual property strategies for different business purposes according to the enterprise's own status, needs, industry technology development trends and competitive environment, and carry out targeted enterprise intellectual work by understanding the background of intellectual property competition.

2. Competitive environment analysis

What is the real demand of the enterprise? How can it use intellectual property for its development and take the development of intellectual property as the initiative for enterprise development? As an intellectual property Manager in the enterprise, the author thinks that the most important thing is to know oneself and the competitors, have an insight into the competitive environment of the industry and the position of the enterprise itself in the ecological industrial chain.

2.1 Insight into the enterprise

Different enterprises have different characteristics and actual needs, and the industries they are involved in are also quite different. Therefore, the focus of the intellectual property work in different enterprises will be different in the actual working process.

Company A is located in the upstream of the industrial chain, and masters the core basic technology and leads the technological development of the entire industry, and is a key core component supplier of the whole equipment. Its core requirement for intellectual property rights lies in: forward-looking layout of basic patents and output of technical standards, which is beyond pure industrial level; leading the technical direction while safeguarding rights to ensure market order, so as to ensure that end-users can access authentic products of high technology and good quality.

At this stage, the focus of its intellectual property work is, first, how to make the enterprise continuously lead the development of the whole industry from the commanding point of technology source through the perfect intellectual property layout; second, how to assist the enterprise to link upper, middle and lower reaches by strategic cooperation to realize the integration of large-scale industrial resources in accordance with the pattern of industrial intellectual property layout; third, how to establish the access rules for different product markets according to the external competitive environment; forth, how to use existing intangible assets to generate income.

Company H for which the author used to work is a large-scale white household appliance control company and a supplier of customized components for clients in the middle of the industrial chain. The demand of its products mainly comes from foreign countries, and they possess a large oversea market demand but low technical barrier. The company mainly carries out international strategic cooperation through customizing original design manufacturer (ODM) with global white appliance giants. The international market is its focus of competition. Its way of working closely with international strategic customers to ensure stable market share and growth and adopting safeguard measures against competitors is not in line with the planning needs for the overall market of the strategic customers. How to compete with domestic homogeneous competitors for the international market was the focus of the company when I worked there.

Generally speaking, because of its stable main business and on the premise that the external intellectual property litigation will not erupt on a large scale, the focus of its intellectual property work is to serve the main business of the enterprise. The priority is how to actively defend intellectual property rights to help protect innovation to gain market competitiveness and increase strategic customer adhesion on the premise of meeting customer demand and product planning. At the same time, it also considers how to guide the decision makers of the company to focus on intellectual property and bring it into its strategic value while providing professional intellectual property services.

2.2 Competitive dynamics analysis

Based on a thorough understanding of the enterprise's own characteristics and needs, the author holds that the enterprise should also dynamically control the changes of the external competitive environment, and flexibly adjust the intellectual property management strategy to suit the dynamic business objectives of the enterprise in light of the current business problems. So how should the intellectual property managers do to dynamically control the changes of the external competitive environment?

2.2.1 Constructing the internal intelligence system and informatization

The author holds that the internal intellectual property management department should establish an internal intelligence system around the different business activities of the company, including but not limited to: technical information system for technology research and guidance of research and development; product intelligence system for product development and promotion; competitor intelligence system for competitors and tracking their latest development trend; industry intelligence system aiming at the industry field and combing the industry's current situation with developing trend.

For example, it should pinpoint the competitors and their positions in the industrial chain and carry out due diligence survey to understand their product technology development route and business operation model, and regularly update for key enterprises to track the dynamics of competing products within the specific industry; categorize the products and industry competing products of the company and the technical braches under each category, carry out patent retrieval and analysis of competitor distribution and technology distribution, and complete information mapping, such as industry competing products, patents, and technology development routes, in order to provide professional support for the company's R&D and marketing decisions.

2.2.2 Constructing the patent information system

The enterprise should collect and analyze the intellectual property information, especially patent information in a timely manner through the information system, and help the company to analyze all kinds of intellectual property risks from the perspective of intellectual property rights to provide reliable basis, timely risk warning and valuable countermeasures for its technological innovation and product promotion. It should manage intellectual property information and achievements in the way of managing project, which is illustrated as follows:

Patent early warning--design technical scheme, market

Conceptual phase    survey report and appearance ID based on the pre-concept, and export patent early warning analysis report and appearance ID infringement evaluation report

 

Planning phase    Patent accumulation
--export patent survey report and 

--patent layout plan based on product specification

 

Development phase   Risk assessment
--conduct technical dismantling and

--comparative analysis based on whole product plan, and 

--complete evasive design and layout planning

                    

Patent portfolio
--full coverage of patents before the

Validation phase     
--product is available (submit IP application) and infringement

--risk exclusion confirmation

                   

Risk screening--investigate poster, brochure, instructions 
Release phase and other related risks involving trademarks, copyrights,  trade secrets, etc. to screen risks

 

Through the output of the information system, the patent information can be applied in the company's intellectual property work mainly in the following links:

A. Patent information inside the enterprise

(1) When a research project is initiated, the R&D engineers and patent engineers should carry out patent technology information retrieval, which is not only retrospective retrieval of the patent information, but also periodic retrieval (once every two weeks), fully analyze the development status of the technology to judge whether there is infringement risk or duplicate research in the main technical scheme and determine the feasible technical route and product scheme, so as to reduce the risk and avoid duplicate research.

(2) In the new product development phase, the patent engineer should follow closely the R&D process, excavate the patent according to the technical statement provided by the R&D personnel, and judge the novelty and creativity of the technology. They should also develop corresponding evasive design according to the search results and the R&D department so as to reduce the application risk, improve the application quality, and effectively protect invention and creation, and this can also further broaden the latter's R&D ideas and in turn will play a catalytic role in the research and development.

(3) The Intellectual Property Department should regularly track and analyze the patents of the company's leading products and technologies, grasp the existing technology level in the field, track its latest development, forecast the trend of technology development, share and interact with the R&D team, and guide the R&D to follow up new technologies and developments. On the one hand, this can improve the starting point of the R&D to a certain extent; on the other hand, through sharing and interacting with the R&D team, it can help the R&D personnel to diverge thinking and conceive a new scheme that conforms to the development trend of the technology.

(4) When exporting products, the company should investigate and analyze the patent application and legal status of the technical scheme in the country to be exported and work out the corresponding countermeasures according to the specific retrieval analysis, so as to avoid infringement disputes when similar products of the company enter the country.

B. Enterprise's external competition patent information

The following measures can be taken to track competitors' patents to strive to grasp the direction of their R&D and set up effective patent warning for key competitors:

(1) In view of the company's concerned competitors, a specific person should be designated to regularly retrieve and interpret the competitor's patent data in accordance with the monthly intellectual property early warning and share the competitor's patent interpretation regularly with the R&D personnel to form a dynamic tracking system;

(2) It should classify the competitors and set up different patent early warning strategies for the competitors at different levels;

(3) It should conduct regular early warning for key technologies and timely capture the information on the competitors in new industries;

(4) It should regularly monitor the competitors' patent litigation, operation and other information.

2.2.3 Market intelligence system construction

Intelligence data is collected by focusing on the distribution of competitors, the distribution of their intellectual property rights, the supply chain resources, and the litigation or prosecution of intellectual property rights involved by the competitors. On the one hand, it should analyze comparatively the intellectual property rights of the homogeneous competitors in the industrial chain and the competitors in the sales area, perfect its own IP layout, evaluate the possibility of IP purchasing or receiving technology licenses, and export the information that helps for the company's product positioning and market demand for the product development direction; on the other hand, it should carry out intellectual property risk assessment of the specific marketing model (exhibition, agents, media advertising, cooperative websites, and alliance marketing) and logistics channels (warehouse ports, countries and regions) and develop targeted intellectual property strategies in marketing, sales and logistics and other market activities.

Through the industrial investigation in the macro direction of the market, the market-end information system is constructed in light of the company's own industry field, market distribution, customer distribution and demand, industrial situation (the form and node of the industrial chain and its position in the industrial chain), and competitive environment (competition pattern and mode). By exporting market-side intelligence data, the intellectual property workers and R&D personnel of the company can avoid reinventing the wheel and produce high-quality intellectual property achievements with more competitive advantages. It can also provide professional support for market-side personnel in intellectual property rights, avoid and mitigate risks for their market behavior and achieve recognition by providing professional serves. In this way, the company's internal market personnel will serve as the external intelligence personnel so that a virtuous circle of information systems can be realized.

3. IP layout strategy

Based on the full understanding of the competitive environment of the company by carrying out intellectual property work as explained above, the author holds that the company should carry out the IP layout strategy suitable for its development strategy according to its different development stages and industrial status, and the relationship between the upstream and downstream of the industrial chain.

Although the work of intellectual property rights is interoperable, the value of internal management of intellectual property rights for the enterprise should be based on its own situation. Therefore, the development of the IP layout strategy suitable for the enterprise’s development strategy should be based on its internal and external characteristics.

3.1 Omnibearing patent layout strategy

Company A, which is located in the upstream of the industrial chain, grasps the core basic technology and leads the technology development of the whole industry, mainly adopts the "omni-directional patent distribution strategy" to maintain the leading competitive advantage in the industry. As for Company A, its development is bound to be integrated into the tide of economic globalization. To occupy a place in the international economic market, the key lies in the possession of knowledge or intellectual resources.

For this reason, the intellectual property management department of Company A got deeply involved in the R&D and marketing projects of the enterprise. It conducted assessment of the sub-strategies for different products according to the country/region where the product is intended to be sold, the competitor's country/region where its product is sold, and the customer's country/region where its product is sold. It took the corresponding intellectual property protection measures (patents, trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets, and integrated circuit layout design) according to the intelligence report issued by the intellectual property information system. It established a perfect intellectual property rights layout in the main business area and core upstream and downstream links of the industry in which the enterprise is located to comprehensively protect the innovative achievements of the enterprise and lay a solid foundation for the follow-up operation of the intellectual property rights.

3.2 Actively defensive patent layout strategy

Generally speaking, the main business of Company H is stable, the accumulation of R&D is increasing, and the external patent risk is not outbreak. At present, the advantages of carrying out patent work outweigh the disadvantages and the challenges outweigh the opportunities. Therefore, it mainly adopts the "actively defensive patent layout strategy". The orientation of its patent work is to serve the main business of the enterprise, enhance patent strength, and ensure future business safety.

Specifically, it can be realized through the following two patent layouts:

First, protective patent layout: it mainly provides sound protection for the enterprise's own superiority technology plan or the product plan, tries to eliminate competitors' chances of circumventing patents by circumventing design, and strives to occupy a patent advantage in individual technology or technology points.

Second, reserve patent layout: it helps to maintain and enhance the market competitiveness in the future product replacement, technological upgrading and industrial transformation, and even carries out patent enclosure ahead of schedule to seek patent control status in some fields; extend the patents deployment and coverage of the enterprise to the possible market competition areas in the future with the orientation of the trend of technology evolution and industrial development.

The specific details of patent layout can include the following aspects:

1) Patent geographic layout

The geographical distribution is mainly determined by the market competitive environment of the enterprise and the situation of its own market and competitors.

First, the location of the existing market and potential market of its own products

The main purpose of patent distribution in these areas is to protect the enterprise's own products, maintain its competitive advantage, and guarantee the market freedom. For Company H, it can mainly consider deploying a considerable amount of patents in the home country of the main customers, the host country of the main competitors, the important market place and other countries or regions for future use.

Second, the location of competitors' existing market and potential market

These areas are the possible delivery areas of the products of Company H. Once competition with competitors occurs in these areas, the enterprise may face the risk of patent litigation from the competitor. Therefore, patent layout is supposed to resolve the threat of patent litigation.

The specific number of patents can be inversely estimated according to the number of patents used by competitors in the areas and the market share capacity of the competitors and Company H itself.

2) Product patent layout

It can be considered from the perspective of the importance of products, the maturity of technology, the originality of products, and the seriation of products.

First, importance

In the layout, key products require special attention and emphasis, including the products with large market share and high sales volume, or the highly technical products with relatively strong competitive advantage which bring greater profits to the enterprise, and the products with good market growth and large expected market size in the future.

Second, maturity

New products should seize the commanding heights, and the freedom of marketing of mature products should be guaranteed, products in the future should be reserved, and the eliminated products can be transferred or abandoned appropriately.

Third, originality

Higher originality allows intensive deployment of original design points to systematically build patent packages that can effectively protect the corresponding products.

Forth, seriation

It is necessary to deploy patents for common technologies contained in such products and to cover their various implementations, applications, improved optimization and alternatives.

For a single product, it may deploy patents for the difference or advantage of the product compared with other products.

3) Patent layout for embedded R&D projects

For pre-research projects to be carried out in R&D projects, patent layout can be carried out by cooperating with relevant links of project management. For example, it can take different patent layout measures in different stages such as concept stage, planning stage, development stage, and verification and listing stage.

The safeguard measures for embedded management of R&D project patent work are as follows:

Resource support: it includes personnel, funds, policies, etc. For example, prior to the establishment of the R&D projects, patents can be independently established, studied or separately listed in the R&D projects.

Training of the R&D project personnel on patent knowledge should be strengthened to enable them to carry out patent related work.

Change the work pattern: the role of the patent department should be changed from working for R&D project management currently to providing patent services for the R&D project and helping it realize self-service.

4. Conclusion

As a Manager of the intellectual property management department of the enterprise, he/she should know the technical status of the enterprise and the industry, and possess good knowledge of intellectual property law. He/she is supposed not only to evade the operational risks for the enterprise with legal thinking, but also to create value for the enterprise with commercial thinking. He/she should lead the enterprise's intellectual property team to conduct effective intellectual property management, taking into account such factors as cost control, internal and external resources mobilization and allocation, and department cooperation. He/she should constantly adjust the strategic positioning of the intellectual property department of the enterprise to make it not only a risk control or professional support department, but also a value-creating department, which will combine intellectual property rights with security strategies, personnel management, market information acquisition, business decision-making, and technology development, and integrate intellectual property rights with enterprise management to make it an important link in the strategic value chain of the enterprise.