IP Audits and Due Diligence
Intellectual property can reside in many areas of a business and can include technology, business methods, databases, trademarks, trade secrets, copyright (e.g. in software code, creative works or manuals), domain names and contractual rights to use such assets. These assets can represent a significant part of a company’s value. But they may not be sufficiently recognized or documented, meaning that they are not being adequately protected or leveraged as much as they could be.
Alternatively, a company may think it owns more intellectual property than it actually does. For instance, there may be gaps in the chain of title through which the company assumes it acquired certain intellectual property. In such cases, it is important for the company (or, more particularly, for an investor or purchaser of the company) to be aware of these gaps.
At Shift Law, we use our expertise in intellectual property law to perform comprehensive audits of our clients’ intellectual property for the purposes of acquisition, financing or simply getting their house in order so that their intellectual property assets can be protected and leveraged as much as possible.
