The intellectual property inventory: Why do it?

Abstract

Over the last ten years, concern about intellectual property 1 protection has risen from relative obscurity into the front line of most corporate strategic protection programs. Yet while intellectual property assets have become more visible to their corporate owners, the inventory process for those assets often remains obscure. Most corporate managers still have difficulty appreciating that an intellectual property asset can be as valuable to the corporation as a tangible or real property asset. In fact, the value of intellectual property assets can far exceed that of tangible assets, as was recently demonstrated by Honeywell's recovery of hundreds of millions of dollars from Minolta in a patent infringement lawsuit.