BRAND LICENSING, NEW INVENTIONS AND PATENTS JUST DON’T MIX.

I have spoken to dozens of people over the years that have a new design, a new product idea, bound to disrupt a mature product category.? The decks are splashy.? The patents are pending.? The inventor is looking for that one brand partnership or patent licensing partner that will take the idea to the stratosphere.

We’ve listened. We’ve pitched.? We’ve tried.? It rarely works.

We understand why professionals gravitate toward this idea.? Patent licensing has been around (literally) since ancient Greece. ??During the Industrial Revolution, patent licensing was instrumental in protecting inventors.? The importance hasn’t changed.

But the market has.

A patent allows for protection around a design or an idea.? But that patent only has economic value if the inventor, or idea generator, can prove – prove – manufacturing viability, and a marketplace that believes the invention actually solves a problem. ??For every problem there are so many competing ideas today that a patent is simply a competitor to another patent.? Only one becomes a market leader.

About fifteen years ago I thought my team unlocked the code.? We had a client that had recently invented a new crib - it allowed extra security for the mattress, creating more protection not only when the infant was asleep but also when said infant was trying to climb out of crib.? Brilliant idea.

We had two strategies – packaging the patent as a value-add for infant furniture manufacturers, that would pay a royalty to our client and retain exclusivity on the design for years to come. Or, alternatively, showcasing such inventions to infant lifestyle brands, that would want to extend their trademark equity to a baby crib genius redefining a category.

The effort failed.? I felt horribly.?

We could not secure a viable licensee for the patent.? We had proof of a cool invention that could differentiate a crib. But we had no proof that we were solving a problem.? We had no sales history to which we could point.? Primary consumer research?? Yes – we had tons.? Didn’t matter.? Prospective licensees saw the research as a sales tool, so we could tell them what they wanted to hear.

Meanwhile, infant apparel brands, infant entertainment properties, toy brand owners and the like all reviewed the opportunity.? No brand licensor made it over the finish line.? For a thousand reasons. But boiling down to the fact that we had an inventor as a client. Not a bona fide, experienced case goods manufacturer.? Brand licensors didn’t need us.? If they wanted to extend into infant furniture, they had dozens of other options.

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We had a patent protected – but we didn’t have a patent that anyone in the baby business saw as more marketable than what they were currently doing.

In hindsight, if the idea was really that good – and it may have been – the best advice I could give our client was to raise capital. Build the inventory. Find a consumer base through SEO. Create an Amazon Merch business model so compelling that new moms and dads would flock to buy on line. Traditional retailers would have watched Amazon taking away their customers (again), and ultimately, they would have bought in too.

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Sounds like Shark Tank.? That’s because it is.? Way, way easier said than done.

But, investors are in the market to subsidize and scale great ideas.? Licensees, by contrast, want to pay royalties toward I/P already proven in the marketplace.? Like CPG trademarks, entertainment properties, and fashion labels. That’s why the brand licensing industry, and brand licensing agencies, exist.?? Try a Google search on patent licensing agencies.? It’s a pretty empty landscape.

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I am building a career in brand licensing, and my team can convince so many different types of companies on the merit.? But – to all innovators, inventors, designers, and problem solvers – please keep doing what you’re doing.? And if you have that have a new patent or a new product idea on paper, don’t pursue licensing agencies.

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Call Mr. Wonderful, or someone like him, and secure equity financing that gives you a business you’re proud to build and a patent you’re proud to maintain.?

Visit us at brandsquaredlicensing.com or licensingonlinkedin.com.