IAM Trend Watch: new corporations selling patents for first time
April 16, 2025 by: Angela Morris
“Companies across various industries are increasingly selling patents for the first time due to a better understanding of IP value and the emergence of AI-fueled patent analytics tools.”
{full article here - paywall}
Our own Tom Hochstatter was interviewed for this article:
“Tom Hochstatter, co-founder and president of Techson IP in Austin, a consulting firm that represents large corporations in many industries, says that companies that formerly strictly prohibited patent monetisation are changing their strategies. The trend spans industry sectors, he says, noting he has seen oil and gas and other energy companies, a defence contractor, medical device companies and some from the chemical industry. Hochstatter says this may be just the beginning. “The hope at this point is that some see these ‘market leaders’ coming into the market and begin to explore the same sorts of initiatives,” he mentions.
The clients engaging his firm to sell patents for the first time tend to mention similar reasons for their companies’ change of heart on monetisation. Hochstatter explains: “There is pressure from the C-suite or board of directors now that we haven't seen before. It's not an overt mandate; it's more just the question, ‘Hey, what are we doing with intellectual property’”?
He points out that companies with large patent portfolios must pay high patent maintenance fees each year across multiple jurisdictions. Renewals get more expensive over time, ratcheting up budgets. Although a patent’s lifespan is 20 years, often corporate strategies pivot every two-to-four years, sometimes leaving a portfolio out of alignment with business goals.
“We are seeing larger and larger portfolios become orphaned for no bad reason other than the company is shifting to new markets,” notes Hochstatter. “They become standalone expenses that they want to divest.” Meanwhile, in the past four to five years, there have been multiple examples of operating companies filing patent litigation against competitors and winning eye-popping sums in the hundreds of millions of dollars.
Some patent holders winning big include United Service Automobile Association, Honeywell International, Textron Innovations and Netlist Inc. Hochstatter’s hunch is that large verdicts influence business leaders to explore the value of their company’s IP. He says: “In one particular case, we had a prospect tell us, ‘I don't necessarily believe I have to monetise my patents, but I have to build a strategic playbook for the executives to let them know that we have a play if we choose at a corporate level to pursue it'. We've been engaged to participate in that. That was an interesting insight. But by and large, once they exercise this activity, they're looking for actual economic benefit – either cost savings on maintenance through divestiture or straight capital.”