The time from issued patent to first royalty cycle, for an independent inventor with a commercial product, often runs past a year. Most of that time goes to three things: finding the right targets, getting through the front door, and negotiating the agreement once you...
A typical patent license agreement runs 18 to 32 pages. About 60% of that document is boilerplate. The other 40% is where the money lives. Inventors who try to read all of it on their own usually catch the obvious problems and miss the ones that cost six figures...
A U.S. utility patent runs 20 years from its earliest non-provisional filing date. Most license agreements written against that patent run shorter. Many run only three to five years before the first renewal decision. The gap between those two clocks is where inventors...
The pitch you hear at trade shows and on inventor podcasts is that licensing is the low-cost path to commercial success. No factory, no inventory, no sales team. Sign a contract and collect royalties. The numbers tell a different story: $8,000 to $30,000 of...
The most common mistake an independent inventor makes in royalty negotiation is asking for too much. The second most common mistake is settling for too little. The middle band where deals close ranges from 2% to 10% of net sales for most product categories, and the...
Two patents can be filed the same week, by inventors with similar resources, and produce very different licensing outcomes. The structure of the license, not just the strength of the patent, shapes how royalties flow over the life of a deal. Choosing between an...
