10 questions about the IP you already have

A portfolio can start with a few illustrations, a useful process, the name customers remember, or software that has grown with your business. You may already look after these things without calling it intellectual property management. Use these questions to see what you have and what needs attention before you pick a spreadsheet, pay for a service, or dig through old folders.

Read all ten first. Jot down your answers, or talk them through with someone who knows the work. Then read the answers below.

The ten questions

1. When you picture an IP portfolio, do you think mainly of registration certificates, or of the wider collection of work and knowledge you rely on?
2. If you paid someone to create something, what would make you confident that you can use it in the ways you now have in mind?
3. What tells you that something in your portfolio is valuable: the effort it took, its legal status, what it earns, or what it makes possible?
4. Would you show the same portfolio to a potential customer, a collaborator, an investor, and a lawyer?
5. How much do you rely on another person or an official reminder to tell you when an important date is approaching?
6. If your business changed its name, address, or owner, which of your IP records would you expect to change as well?
7. If a key collaborator left tomorrow, could someone else understand how the rights in your main project fit together?
8. Where would you look for the conditions attached to photographs, software, music, or other material you are allowed to use?
9. Would your portfolio still describe the work you do today, or would it mostly describe an earlier version of your business?
10. Which part of managing IP would you most like to make easier: finding things, understanding ownership, meeting dates, sharing work, or deciding what matters?

The answers

1. When you picture an IP portfolio, do you think mainly of registration certificates, or of the wider collection of work and knowledge you rely on?

Start with what your work depends on, not with certificates. WIPO’s IP audit covers the IP a business owns and uses: registered rights such as copyrights, domain names, designs, patents and trademarks; unregistered assets such as software, trade secrets and unregistered copyrights; and the agreements with IP terms in them, such as employment contracts, non-disclosure agreements, supplier contracts and licenses.1 So your list might hold product photographs, your software, confidential production know-how, a registered brand, and the license that lets you use someone else’s illustrations. Putting an item on the list does not prove you own it. The list is where you record what you know and what you still need to check.

2. If you paid someone to create something, what would make you confident that you can use it in the ways you now have in mind?

A signed agreement that says who owns the work, or exactly what you may do with it. An invoice proves you paid; it does not move the copyright. In the U.K., an employer is the first owner of work an employee makes in the course of employment, but when you commission a freelancer, the creator owns the copyright unless you agree otherwise in writing.2 Buying the copyright outright takes a written agreement signed by the copyright owner.6 In the U.S., copyright belongs first to the author (for a work made for hire, to the employer or the person it was made for), and a transfer is valid only in a writing signed by the owner.7 Before you put a commissioned design on a new product or license it to someone, read the invoice, the agreement and any stock-image license together, and check that they cover the new use.

3. What tells you that something in your portfolio is valuable: the effort it took, its legal status, what it earns, or what it makes possible?

What it makes possible. A modest piece of software that saves your team hours deserves more attention than a name you registered for a project you dropped. A community archive can matter because it keeps knowledge available, even if nobody plans to sell it. Write down next to each item why it matters to you. That reason tells you where to spend time and money, and revisit it as the work changes.

4. Would you show the same portfolio to a potential customer, a collaborator, an investor, and a lawyer?

No. A customer needs examples of finished work. A partner needs a clear description of what you can license. A lawyer needs the agreements behind that description. Sending every file to everyone exposes things you may want to keep confidential, and for a trade secret that matters: WIPO lists reasonable steps to keep the information secret as one of the conditions for protection, including confidentiality agreements with employees and business partners and control over who can open important documents.3 Keep a short public overview, and a detailed folder you share only with the people who need it, under a non-disclosure agreement where secrets are involved.

5. How much do you rely on another person or an official reminder to tell you when an important date is approaching?

Do not rely on the reminder. For a U.S. trademark registration, you must file a Section 8 declaration between the fifth and sixth years after registration, a combined Section 8 and 9 renewal between the ninth and tenth years, and a renewal every ten years after that. Each deadline has a six-month grace period with an extra fee, and if you miss the grace period the registration is canceled or expires. The USPTO sends courtesy email reminders, but you must file on time even if none arrives.4 Check the current fees on the USPTO fee schedule.8 For every date in your records, note the official deadline, the source of that deadline, the person responsible, and your own earlier working reminder. If an attorney or agent files for you, agree in writing who supplies the documents, who approves the cost, and who confirms the filing went through.

6. If your business changed its name, address, or owner, which of your IP records would you expect to change as well?

Every official record that names you, and the change is not automatic. For a U.S. trademark, the USPTO treats three events differently. If the rights moved to a new owner, that is an assignment. If the same owner’s legal name changed, that is a name change. Record either one through the USPTO’s Assignment Center. If only your correspondence address or attorney changed, use the TEAS Change of Address or Representation (CAR) form, which cannot change the owner’s name.5 Recording an ownership change has a fee, listed on the USPTO fee schedule.8 The database does not always update itself after recording, so check the Trademark Status and Document Retrieval (TSDR) system afterwards. If it says the ownership records were not automatically updated, file the TEAS form that makes the change.5 When a sale or restructuring moves rights to a new owner, have an IP attorney draft the written assignment and record it with the USPTO.

7. If a key collaborator left tomorrow, could someone else understand how the rights in your main project fit together?

Test it. Pick your main project and explain its history to an imagined new colleague. Who created each part? What agreements did they sign? Which versions were delivered? Where are the documents? Write the answers down next to the files; a folder of unexplained files leaves the next person guessing. Pay special attention to work made together: in the U.S., the authors of a joint work co-own its copyright.7 If an ownership question is unresolved, write that plainly. A polished summary must not turn an open question into a promise.

8. Where would you look for the conditions attached to photographs, software, music, or other material you are allowed to use?

Next to the material itself. Save the license terms in the same folder as the file they cover. U.K. government guidance explains that a copyright license can limit you to specified purposes, a set period or particular places, and that you need another license to use the material for something else.6 So an image licensed for your website may need a new license before it goes on a product range. A note such as “licensed from supplier, terms saved here, check before merchandise use” is far more useful than a folder called “paid assets.”

9. Would your portfolio still describe the work you do today, or would it mostly describe an earlier version of your business?

Update it at the moments that count. WIPO names five: setting strategy or reorganizing, before working with investors or lenders, before working with acquirers or partners, when cutting costs or building revenue, and when preparing for licensing or litigation.1 A new collaborator or product launch is another natural point. Between those moments, a regular review catches the quieter changes: a product you no longer sell, a contact who has left, a permission you have outgrown. You do not have to rebuild everything at once. Update the items behind the decisions you are making now, and keep a visible note of the rest.

10. Which part of managing IP would you most like to make easier: finding things, understanding ownership, meeting dates, sharing work, or deciding what matters?

Start there. If finding agreements takes an afternoon, build a simple index. If you are preparing a partnership, focus on ownership and permissions. If dates worry you, start with the calendar and the people responsible. A portfolio is useful when it answers a real question. Use a document or spreadsheet you already know, and move to a more elaborate tool only once you know what it would improve.