Businesses are always on the lookout for ways to maximize profitability and add additional income streams. This is why intellectual property licensing can be such a boon for established Juneau, Alaska, businesses.
Intellectual property licensing?
Intellectual property refers to your business’s patents, trademarks and copyrights. Licensing your intellectual property portfolio allows you to monetize these assets by licensing them out to other people and businesses. This means that your business can still utilize your intellectual property portfolio, but earn passive income from that portfolio, in addition to your normal business income. This income can be used for anything, including expanding the business, bonuses, research and development or any other allowable business expense. The only expense needed is at the beginning to set up the license.
Licensing strategies
The first step is finding a Juneau, Alaska, intellectual property licensing expert that can guide you through the process and help you identify your goals and objectives. Specifically, what are you looking to accomplish through licensing without hurting your primary business? One could license their business name to other providers, like the Radisson licensing their name to private hotel owners.
Downsides
Keep in mind that there are downsides to intellectual property licensing. For example, once one has your brand, they could potentially hurt it, so having safeguards in place can ensure your brand is not negatively impacted is important. For example, if Radisson licensed its name to a bad hotel owner, the customers that have bad experiences with that bad hotel owner will impute those negative interactions with the Radisson brand. Similarly, if one licenses their technology patents to other companies, they may lose market share to those same companies. This is why intellectual property licensing experts are so important to the process because one does not know what they do not know, until an expert points it out.
Downside mitigation
Of course, intellectual property licensing agreements will include penalties for infringement, or breaking the licensing agreement. However, there should also be indemnification provisions as well, in case your licensee is sued based on your license. You should also pick your legal form and the governing laws that are best suited for this transaction and to protect your business’s interests. This may or may not be Alaska law. In addition, think about how you want to resolve disputes and put a dispute resolution provision into the intellectual property licensing agreement.