The latest Patent Program Benchmark Survey from IP management and analytics software company Lecorpio has found that 42 per cent of surveyed in-house counsel are tracking quality as a key performance indicator for their company’s patent program, a 12 per cent increase from last year’s survey. The growing emphasis on quality still lags behind counting the total number of patents submitted, which is used as a KPI by 63 per cent of those in-house lawyers who took part in this year’s survey. However, the use of KPIs for patent programs seem to be on the up, with the number of respondents who said they do not measure or track any performance indicators shrinking from 42 per cent in last year’s survey to 36 per cent this year.

Feedback from inventors

Lecorpio vice president of marketing Elisa Cooper told Corporate Counsel that it was surprising to see so few in-house counsel conducting formal surveys to gather feedback on their patent programs from patent inventors. She said: ‘There's valuable information to be gained from inventors on whether the process is working for them. There's a lot of online hosted survey providers out there but [in-house counsel can send] even just a quick email to gauge what's working and what could be done better, so inventors know this is something in-house counsel is committed to.’ While 75 per cent of in-house counsel held face-to-face meetings with inventors, only 5 per cent undertook formal surveys to obtain feedback about their program.