steven sunstein - creating effective business partnerships to accelerate innovation
TRANSCRIPT
Should a Young Healthcare
Company Care About
Protecting Innovation?
Steven Saunders
Sunstein Kann Murphy & Timbers LLP
March 30, 2015
•
Healthcare Companies have special attributes:
• Long Development times
• High Margins
• Large Markets
• High Demand
• Potential for $$ large profits $$ if successful
Barriers to Entry
• Long and expensive R & D cycles
• Long and expensive regulatory processes
• Highly specialized expertise
It’s all about market share!
• Develop an arsenal of offensive weapons
• The other barriers were only defensive
How?
• Develop and manage a patent estate
• Maintain effective processes for licenses, agreements with third parties and employees, NDAs, trade secrets, etc.
• And…
Make sure your company can sell your product without infringing someone else’s patent
• Competitors
• Universities
• Non-practicing entities
• Individual inventors (e.g., doctors)
Who cares about this?
• You do!! (even if you don’t realize it)
• Investors
• Potential Acquirers
• Analysts for IPOs
• Future talent/hires
• Competitors
• Development Partners
• Customers
• Poor IP practices can sink an acquisition or financing!
– The diligence process often highlights the warts in company IP processes