Whether you are an individual inventor, a small company or a large commercial enterprise Creative Insight can provide a tool kit for you to maximise the benefits of patents rights. We are the leading resource centre in the West Midlands, part of the European PatLib Network and offer a wide range of free and fee-based services from our premises.
Commercial Services | Research Facilities | Support and Guidance
You can commission our staff to carry out detailed patent research on your behalf using quality commercial databases at very reasonable costs. (prices page)
For the investigation of potential new patents our research service uses the industry leader, “Derwent Innovations Index”.
We construct a search strategy based on the information that you supply
and deliver a report consisting of patent abstracts that covers both the
technical background and what is currently considered state-of-the-art.
This report is presented for your consultation.
A further ten full-text documents from the report may be requested at no
extra charge.
We will further investigate the history and status of any reported patent.
This will uncover the technological background to the innovation. We can
then follow this technology to discover how it has further influenced subsequent
patents.
Armed with this knowledge you will be in the best position to make an informed choice about how you progress your proposed new patent.
Other specialised services include:
Competitive Intelligence
Searching patents is an effective way to find information on the business and development activities of UK, and international public and privately held companies.
Patents provide the name of the inventor, a technical description of a patented device or composition of matter (drug, alloy, etc.) and the legal description of what is protected. Patents may also provide the name of the assignee or owner of the patent. By obtaining a regular search you can see at a glance whom is doing what in a particular industry, or what a particular company is interested in from a research and development point of view. Simple patent counts can be used to determine technological activity such as R&D.
Analysis of patent references can provide additional information regarding the importance of patents. Patents can refer to earlier patents (prior art) and can themselves be cited by later patents. Thus each patent can be considered to have been influenced by the earlier one. Additionally a company can refer to other patents held by itself or its subsidiaries. This is called a self-reference and indicates the company concerned is building on its own technology. Co-citations, where two or more patents are cited by a third, are usually related in subject matter. This means that ‘cluster analysis’ can be performed without necessarily reading each patent. The existence of a cluster of patents is an indication that the company thinks it has a core invention, which it considers worthwhile protecting by improvement inventions. When a company refers to the patents of other companies, it is usually building on someone else's technology. These other companies are in fact ‘teaching’ their competitors.
Technical Problem Solver
85% of the technical information held in Patents is unobtainable anywhere
else, yet this is an information source neglected to their cost by businesses
and individuals.
Have you hit a snag with part of your invention? Do you need to improve
part of your manufacturing process or equipment? Had an idea but not sure
if it’s worth the cost of developing? Use the patent source available
to see if others have solved the problem, or tried a solution that has failed,
or made the adjustment you need. Learn from the work and mistakes of others,
at minimal cost to you, as well as ensuring that you are not breaching others’
patent rights.
To offer our clients a comfortable environment in which to work we have our PC workstations in private consultation rooms ensuring confidentiality, and trained staff on hand to assist you in your searches. Within the West Midlands the following databases are only available at our centre.
Derwent Innovations Index Access to more than 20 million patents, with links to cited and citing patents, relevant literature, and full-text patent data sources. The original patent titles are rewritten to make them more meaningful. Part of the ISI Web of Knowledge
GlobalPat
Espace
Access Europe
These databases are backed by over 35 more, assisting you with other patent-related processes such as product searches, market research and articles searches.
Our electronic resources are fully supported by our extensive patent publication collection and a wide range of patent office and internally produced material.
This service covers over 14m patents, and for those who need to research in non-electronic format, there are over 15m patents available in our archive area.
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Support and Guidance
Our specialist staff provides support and guidance on patent research strategies
so that you get the best out of our facilities. We can signpost you to information
concerning official procedures for patent application worldwide, as well
as extensive UK Patent Office material.
This support includes free one to one consultation sessions of up to an
hour.
Business Support
We have extensive resources and facilities available for those who need help in using their patent to get a business started or who just need help in business affairs. These may include company formation, grants, market research, product checks, business plans, marketing lists and much more.
Learning
For those with a deeper interest in patents and the issues surrounding them we can provide workshops and talks on our premises free of charge or on a customer’s premises for an appropriate fee.
Professional Advice
Business Insight hosts a number of Professional Advice Clinics.
Our clients can use local Chartered Institute
of Patent Agents (CIPA) members for a twenty minute free confidential
consultation.
Publications
We provide a comprehensive range of patent publications at our site as well as our own range of patent fact sheets on practical aspects of patents.
