Medical device innovations and IP: A strategy is everything.
Bringing a medical device to market relies on a broad understanding of IP, explain Sabing Lee and Kregg Koch of Knobbe Martens.
The original version of this article was published by Life Sciences IP Review. Click here to view that article.
The medical device industry is driven by innovation, where great ideas are developed into successful businesses and products to improve patient care and outcomes. As patent attorneys, we witness many different pathways to innovation and guide IP strategies for innovators of all types. From garage start-ups that become global industry leaders to incubators and university-funded research programs, innovation has no common starting point.
One certainty exists, though. A properly executed IP strategy, tailored to the medical device industry, is critical for protecting innovation, creating company value and ultimately supporting the commercialization of products that will benefit patients.
Sources of Medical Device Innovation
One common starting point for medical device innovation is the physician. Many new innovations start from individual practitioners, such as a surgeon or other specialist who works first-hand with the types of devices that he or she improves upon.
Whether orthopedic, cardiovascular, neurological, or other, physicians with first-hand experience in the causes of medical conditions, the outcomes from devices and treatments, and the implementation of the devices and treatments are often the best equipped to recognize a need for improvement and to foster innovation. This is the reason why a significant number of medical devices come from or are developed in consultation with physicians.
Medical device innovation is an iterative process, and a significant amount of engineering work is needed to translate an initial concept into a viable product. Some physicians are garage inventors themselves, building prototypes using household parts or buying and assembling components into something that can be tested in trials.
Frequently, physicians seek out partnerships with engineers who can assist in this process, and many important medical technologies have resulted from the physician-engineer collaboration. Engineers themselves are also often inspired by new medical ideas and will seek out the clinical perspectives of a physician to refine and improve upon these ideas.
Protecting IP is especially important to the solo inventor, who often starts with only an idea and needs to secure some degree of protection, typically with a provisional patent application, before disclosing the idea to others.
Solo inventors and early-stage companies should also take care in securing ownership rights to their inventions when seeking the help of others. Non-disclosure agreements, while helpful in maintaining confidentiality, do not typically include IP assignment clauses. Without an IP assignment agreement, the solo inventor runs the risk that one of their collaborators improves upon the invention and claims ownership of the improvement for themselves.
While many innovations are the result of spontaneous inspiration, incubators, who form another important group of innovators, follow a more structured process. Incubators are organizations, including university-sponsored entities (sometimes called biodesign programs), that usually comprise individuals having orthogonal skill sets and backgrounds that form a multi-disciplinary team.
Incubators often include physicians, engineers, scientists, and business professionals.
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