After more than 25 years working with biotech innovators, I’ve learned that the real value of a patent family lies in the inventive scope where your science, legal strategy, and innovation truly meet . That intersection is what I call the patent sweet spot . So, what exactly is the sweet spot? It’s the range of claim scope that matches the working examples in your application — broad enough to protect what matters commercially, but grounded enough in data to avoid overreach

Innovation, collaboration, and thoughtful IP strategy, that’s what built Invitrogen’s success. And it’s still what drives the best biotech companies today. In 2004, I joined Invitrogen , one of the most dynamic biotech companies of its time. Recently, I came across my old Invitrogen catalog from that year, a snapshot of the start of the company’s golden era, and it brought back a flood of memories. The catalog reads like a roll call of transformative tools: Lipofectamine, Su

Every biotech CEO says it. “We are committed to strong patents.” But here’s the uncomfortable truth: words don’t build patent fortresses. Budgets do. The question that separates talk from true commitment is simple: 👉  What percentage of your R&D budget is dedicated to experiments requested by your patent team to strengthen and broaden patents? If the answer is $0 , or “we don’t really track that,” then your company may be more vulnerable than you realize. Without patent-stre

Why Your Biotech Patent Keeps Getting Rejected, and What to Do About It. If your biotech patent application keeps getting rejected, it’s tempting to blame the patent examiner. But in most cases, the real issue is a weak patenting strategy or poor execution  — both of which can be fixed. Here’s how to diagnose what’s going wrong and turn things around. Point 1 – Are You Relying on Only One Examiner and One Claiming Strategy? If you have only one application, one examiner, and

“Bio/pharma funding deal data in H1 2025 reveals a troubling downward shift starting in February.” Investment in bio/pharma was down in H1 2025 according to data from the BiopharmIQ database¹. From the total first half data, this was most apparent in data related to public companies. However, more troubling were the downward trends in bio/pharma investment seen as 2025 progressed. Q2 2025 had the lowest private and post-IPO public funding activity of any quarter since Q1 2024

Struggling to get tough biotech patents allowed? A reactive, traditional "strategy" often fails. Try these 4 proactive, effective patenting tips to get valuable patents to issue.   FILE A ROBUST PATENT APPLICATION It starts at the top; Give yourself your best chance at success with a robust patent application filing with numerous fallbacks supported by working examples with surprising results. FILE A DECLARATION DURING PROSECUTION WITH SUPPORTIVE AND SURPRISING DATA Strengthe

Biotech products and processes evolve over time. This can cause a misalignment between your issued/pending patent claims, and your improved processes and products. Thus, your patent team needs to stay closely connected to your R&D and product teams. Are your patent, product and R&D teams well connected? To find out, pose this question to your in-house IP coordinator/Chief patent counsel: Has an experienced patent attorney confirmed that the claims of our issued patents/pendin

Too many biotech companies treat IP like a checkbox. Smart ones prune ruthlessly—and build value, not just volume: Prune entire families that no longer support the pipeline. Cut spend in countries with low ROI. Re-align IP quarterly with product + clinical shifts. Read below to learn more. Patent spend can get out of control, unless you prune your company's low value patent families. This is especially true for biotech companies that are at least 3 years old. Pruning can be c

INTRODUCTION Executives usually ask these quantitative but high-level questions: How much money did we spend on patent work this year? Was that within our IP budget? How many patent applications did we file this year? How many patents issued to our company this year? While those questions touch upon important metrics, this post provides much deeper and more insightful questions to ask, to much more effectively assess your IP team’s performance at building your company’s paten

As a biotech company, much of your value is in (pre-revenue) and/or protected by (post-revenue) your intellectual property. As you attempt to approach investors for your next round of financing, or as you consider reaching out re: potentially being acquired, it is important that your intellectual property documents are in order, and you understand your IP strengths and weaknesses and strategy. Here's a diligence checklist annotated with some pro tips that you can use to assu

Common misconceptions about patent rights: In my decades of counseling life sciences companies, I have found that many inventors and professionals are not aware of these counterintuitive fundamental principles of patent law: Patents grant a negative right: The right to exclude (or block) others from practicing an invention. [FN1] (See FIG.) Patents do NOT grant inventors the right to practice their invention. [FN2] Why is it important for you to understand these counteri

When should we assure we have FTO for our private biotech company? Summary: FTO for a private biotech company is typically a multi-stage process that should be started early and updated periodically to gain the right level of confidence during different product development and company funding stages. This leads up to a signoff deadline before product designs are locked, and continues post-launch to avoid difficult surprises and to assure proper action is taken with respect t