New website about IP: LegalForce

A new website has launched in the last few days, LegalForce, and there are some initial comments about it from the IPKat and Kevin O'Keefe.

Well, I've signed up and snooped around and this is my take on it.

What is LegalForce?

At the time of writing this review, the site is clearly labelled as "Beta" and so we can expect changes as the things gets going.

This is what is says about itself:

"LegalForce is a marketplace for intellectual property, powered by a professional network for inventors, patent attorneys, entrepreneurs, licensing professionals and investors.

Marketplace
With the marketplace, members can buy, sell and license intellectual property . Listing patents for sale and license empowers members to reach a network of thousands of potential buyers and licensees. Buyers can view the listings for free.

Network
Members can post and share videos , and share ideas and collaborate with others with an interest in intellectual property. They can form their own groups, and create and participate in discussions. Inventors and entrepreneurs can use the network to present their ideas to investors.

IP Services
Members can find and connect with intellectual property services providers within the network."

Who's behind the company?

There seem to be some big names in the US patent field. The cvs for the management team and advisors certainly makes impressive reading. Of course, this doesn't guarantee success! The business is currently seeking US$2m of funding.

The marketplace

Although the marketplace is described as somewhere to "buy, sell and licence intellectual property", it actually only seems to be focused on patents and so it would be good to see it cover other types of rights. There is definately a lack of market-places for these types of activities, however, time will tell whether it will work in practice (see also my article about J Isern's Domimark service)

For example, will advertising your patent for sale on this website (or any other like it) have an impact on levels of patent infringement?

There seem to be a couple of hundreds patents listed already. The search interface is simple and I'll be intereste to see if this gets more sophisticated as the number of patents on the system grows. I guess that there might be scope in the future, I can't see it there yet, for an RSS feed against specific criteria. This would be useful if you were looking to licence a patent in a particular patent class, say, and wanted to know as soon as anyone posted one.

The range of patents on the system is pretty diverse already ranging from a vehicle location system for $15,000 a year royalty to an earring insert for pierced ears or other body parts for $5,000 a year.

Clicking on any of the listed patents gives the full patent text and claims and PDFs of the patent publications as well as listing the inventor and assignee.

There is the scope for people to comment on patents and it will be fascinating to see how this develop? Will potential licensees use the facility to raise initial queries? Will competitors try to claim that the patent is invalid? Will disgruntled inventors try to put others off licensing it? Only time will tell.

Each patent seems to carry a quality/value rating and this is graphically represented by a number of stars. As at today, on the 21 pages listing patents there were thirty-nine 2-stars, two 3-stars and the rest are 1-stars. It's not obvious to me what distinguishes the ranking between the patents and I could see any patents with listed comments (I didn't go through them all but clicked on a number at random). However, more hunting around in the text shows that this is LegalForce's own assessment of the patent offered for sale. I've found this slightly confusing because the How it Works page suggests that reviews are optional (presumably at the request of the seller?)

LegalForce says that its marketpace doesn't actually conclude contracts and that bidding on a patent is an invitation to negotiate. It is also saying that it won't charge brokerage fees during the introductory phase, at least before June 2007. This doesn't strike me as a very long period to get something like this really going. I guess the longer-term success will depend upon the level of brokerage fees. Will it be the eBay of the IPWorld?

Network

To access the network you need to sign up as a member. The sign up page is about as simple as it gets but does require you to accept the company's terms and conditions, which are hyperlinked.

These are pretty much as you would expect but there are a couple of things to note:

• Under "Limitations of Use" there is the following sentence: "You agree that the Content may not be copied, reproduced, distributed, republished, displayed, posted or transmitted in any form or by any means, including, but not limited to, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the express prior written consent of LegalForce." This seems to contradict the reality of the service in that you are actually going to want to print off, copy or circulate stuff that you find useful on the site. If you are considering licensing a patent through the service, you will want to show your colleagues/investors what you have found and the stuff about the LegalForce site.
• Use of your personal data is governed by a separate privacy policy, for which there is a hyperlink in the footer of each page.
• The company can change its terms and conditions whenever it wants.

The privacy policy is pretty good actually. Being cynical you might think that they were just wanting to get a big database together that they could rent out for marketing purposes. Doesn't look like this is the case at all. In reality, of course, you only provide as much information about yourself as you want and then decide how much of that you want to make part of your public profile. Users of other social networking services will immediately recognize the approach here.

Once you've signed up you can upload your picture and choose your profile. This is fairly simply stuff. You can create your own network, a bit like with LinkedIn - but not so sophisticated. You can also access and post to the forums, which are at the moment:

• Intellectual Asset Management
• Patent Portfolio Planning
• Patent Strategy
• Protecting Patents Internationally
• Technology Transfer
• Trade Marks
• Open Source
• Avoiding Litigation
• Valuing Intellectual Property
• USPTO
• Invention Marketing

There doesn't seem to be any way to create new groups. I suspect that this is simply a control thing for the time being. There were no entries in any of the forums so I posted in the trade marks forum to try and get the ball rolling.

You can also create and join groups. I created one called "International Brand Protection" and will be interested to see what, if anything, happens. There's not much guidance about what groups are for or how they work. There's no obvious help system.

As far as I can see at the moment, there are about 600 people (101 pages with 6 members per page with a few less on the last page) in the network at the moment. A few have bothered to upload photos and profiles, but not very many yet. I suspect that its at that significant catch-22 phase where people are logging on to have a look and their reaction will be very much dependent upon what level of activity and profiles they see when they first look at the thing. A quick search around the directory shows one other user in the UK, and only 18 in the US so I'm not sure where all the other users are!

IP Services
This is the service offering for which LegalForce will be seeking to make money. In effect, it is a law corporation run by US attorneys with the technical and support staff based in India. A white paper on the site reveals the true nature of what the founders are getting at:

"LegalForce is an integrated legal services model designed by U.S. attorneys to target inefficiencies at the core of the patent legal profession."

A little further reading shows the writers, Raj Abhyanker and Babar Rana, share some passions close to my heart:

"Yet despite the critical role it plays in economic progress, the legal profession remains somewhat of an island in time. Law firms continue to operate under the same archaic principles and structures of yesteryear, resilient to the changing face of the service industry and seemingly impervious to economic pressures."

At the heart of what they are doing is legal process outsourcing to change their business model. They aim to provide attorneys in their network with sources of referrals and work but with the support outsourced.

Conclusions
Many will doubt the ability of LegalForce to succeed or make a difference. However, I believe that we should welcome this new entrant. The broader legal profession needs disruptive service providers to help move the whole professional and, just on that basis alone, I wish them every success.

I think there is a lot of potential with their service and the opportunity to create a genuine marketplace service for which there are no big players at all.

The business is clearly very focused on patents and I think this reflects on the company's rather descriptive and non-distinctive "LegalForce" brand. I think they missed a trick here in not picking a really good, unusual and memorable brand.