Portfolio Optimization & Budgeting
Spend less. Protect more.
Patents are expensive. Provisionals cost money to convert. Maintenance fees escalate every four years. And most companies pay all of it on autopilot - renewing everything, converting everything, without ever asking which assets actually drive business value. A shrewd budget analysis changes that. We analyze your entire patent portfolio against your business direction, market position, product roadmap, and competitive landscape to build a prioritized budget strategy that keeps your strongest assets fully funded while identifying where you can save, by lapsing low-value families, consolidating overlapping filings, deferring non-critical conversions, or strategically timing national phase entries. The result is a leaner, stronger portfolio that costs dramatically less to maintain.
Typical Outputs
- Prioritized patent budget strategy
- Multi-year cost optimization model
- Lapse and consolidation recommendations
- Stronger, leaner patent portfolio
Every engagement is custom-scoped. Learn more →
Why it matters
Companies routinely spend six and seven figures annually maintaining patent families that no longer align with their business. Startups burn precious runway converting every provisional without understanding which filings actually protect their competitive position. Large enterprises pay escalating maintenance fees on thousands of patents they've never mapped to a product or revenue stream. ipCG's budgeting engagements have saved clients hundreds of thousands of dollars — often paying for themselves ten times over in the first year alone. More importantly, the exercise forces a strategic reckoning that makes the surviving portfolio dramatically more valuable and defensible.
Core Workstreams
Full portfolio audit mapping every patent family to business lines, products, markets, and competitive positioning
Maintenance fee and prosecution cost modeling with multi-year budget projections across jurisdictions
Priority scoring framework ranking assets by strategic value, competitive relevance, licensing potential, and cost-to-maintain
Actionable recommendations identifying candidates to maintain, consolidate, defer, license, or lapse — with projected savings