At Evolve, we believe IP strategy should be an enabler of your business goals. Not all IP is equal, and having patent filings is not enough. Your IP strategy must align with your science, your development plan and the long-term goals of you and your investors. And IP only creates value if the people who matter understand it, so we also help you explain it clearly to boards, investors, partners and your own scientists.
Strategy that follows the science
We start with the science and the product. Our attorneys combine scientific expertise with in-house pharma experience, so we can identify the innovations that matter, decide how best to protect them, and build layers of protection around a product over its lifecycle.
Patents, trade secrets and regulatory exclusivity
Effective strategy uses every tool available. We help you decide what to patent and when, what to keep as a trade secret, and how patents interact with regulatory exclusivities, SPCs and paediatric extensions to maximise the period of market protection.
Platform and product
For platform companies, we help separate platform IP from product IP so that each can be licensed, partnered or sold on its own terms.
Lifecycle management
For products in the clinic or on the market, we plan follow-on protection such as formulations, dosage regimens, new indications and combinations, and assess the loss of exclusivity position against generics and biosimilars.
Investors and partners
Investors and partners want to know how long the market is protected, in which countries, and why a competitor cannot simply design around. We help you answer those questions clearly, with loss of exclusivity forecasts (Evolve Insights), data room narratives and investor presentations that stand up to diligence.
Boards and leadership
We report IP risks and opportunities to boards in plain language, with portfolio summaries and visual timelines that show where protection is strong, where it is thin and what decisions are coming up.
Scientists and an IP-aware culture
IP strategy works best when your scientists understand it. We run practical training on invention disclosure, publication planning, confidentiality and how to read a patent (Evolve Insights), and help you set up simple processes for capturing inventions.
Publications and public statements
Press releases, conference abstracts, trial registrations and papers are all prior art. They do not always destroy a later filing, but they need to be planned (Evolve Insights). A study protocol on its own may not support a later claim, so the timing of disclosures and filings has to be coordinated (Evolve Insights).
Fractional IP counsel
Our fractional IP counsel model places a named senior patent attorney inside your team as your head of IP, combining deep patent expertise with the strategic and commercial oversight of senior in-house counsel, and making sure the strategy is carried through day to day.
Why fractional IP counsel for IP strategy and communication? Strategy is set in board meetings and R&D reviews, not in patent offices. Our patent directors have done that job inside pharma and biotech companies, so they bring the real-world industry experience that you only get working in-house and know how to explain a portfolio to investors and partners. They carry the strategy through drafting, prosecution and deals with the support of our specialist team, Gilbert and Ammonite charts, which a traditional IP firm or a consultant working alone cannot provide. Everything is joined up, easy to explain and built on a global strategic approach.
Contact us today to discuss your IP strategy and how to explain it.
Evolve AI
Gilbert: Quality enhancement
Gilbert gives every draft and every response a second read against the law, the science and your instructions, and grades what it finds.
Patent documents are long, repetitive and unforgiving. One inconsistency between the claims and the description, or a sequence that does not quite match the lead, can sink a patent years later. Gilbert is our second or third pair of eyes before anything goes out:
- Specification QE: inconsistencies, omissions and drafting slips across claims, description and figures
- Sequence and compound QE: whether the claims really cover the lead sequence, compound or Markush formula
- Prosecution QE: the response checked against the law, the science, your instructions and the attorney’s own notes
- IP strategy QE: the claims checked against the strategy we agreed for the family
Each issue is graded critical, high, medium or low and the attorney decides what to change. The result is fewer formalities objections, fewer unnecessary claim fees, and the odd sequence error caught before it reaches the register. Related reading: the unforgiving gold standard.
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