Where's the Beef

(XXII) Negotiation is where Beef is made: SPIN

Negotiation is where Beef is made: SPIN
My conclusion and experience is that the value of a patent is “what you can get” – and that is a matter of negotiation. Of course, you can try to convince your counterpart-to-become- partner with all the different methods and(s)he may try to do the same with you. You will find many experts and books on the psychology of negotiation searching the web, most of whom will focus on the dialogue. My old colleague and friend, Henning Sejer Jacobsen has written an interesting book about his experiences and runs a workshop series about it. I find that negotiation is 96% preparation and 4% SPIN method. Where’s the Beef, then is 96% about preparation and 4% SPIN. What is SPIN?

Unlike most sales training methods, Neil Rackham spent 12 years on studying why traditional sales models, which were developed for small consumer sales, just don't work for large sales. He shows how conventional selling methods are doomed to fail in major sales. But most important of all, he explains with clarity the successful SPIN strategy. Creating collaborative agreements between industry and university is a “complex” or major sales situation. SPIN sales are rarely completed in one meeting or one exchange of information; rather several meetings.

Another aspect of collaboration agreements is that the persons who open the communication are not the only and seldom the final decision makers. For example, I have uploaded documents in the Beef Knowledge Management Platform about how large corporations negotiate license deals. Inevitably, you’ll see that there often are Technical Review Boards or Committees who manage different aspects of performing “due diligence” analysis.

The basic insight of Neil Rackham’s SPIN thesis is that there are different types of dialogue and the successful sales follow a pattern: the first dialogues cover S-questions: namely about (the counterpart-to-become-partner’s- Situation, ie. a form of personal grounding (“as simple as “how are you”? “who are you”?). The follows a series of dialogues about P-questions: ie. Problem related, now focusing on the problem at hand. Thirdly, the negotiation moves into I-phase, standing for Implications (of finding a solution to the Problem). Finally, and this is where the economist methods start and end, SPIN sales concern themselves with N-questions: the Needs-Payoff or Net Present Value of a solution to the Problem.

Rackham, who has founded the Huthwaite Group, which offers sales training to many corporates around the world, only gets to the “money” issue at the very last moment. Is there a difference between communication in technology transfer and in commercial innovation practise? And if so, specify how and why!

Certainly Beef Communication has many similarities with models of successful business communication in relation to complex sales/business operations.  Successful business communicators, according to Rackham, use these question types in complex negotiation cases, never at the same time but always in a sequence of meetings (communications) and always in this order. A solution is never offered immediately, but only after a thorough mutual understanding of the SPIN aspects has been reached. In many ways, the typical Technology transfer model corresponds quite well with Rackham’s SPIN model, which leads me to claim that Beef Communication is not generically different from complex sales negotiations. My conclusion from this is that there is no reason to believe that the TT profession is very much dissimilar to ordinary SPIN Selling.

One important distinction may be made in the case of application of early stage or prototype research results to commercial practise. In most of Rackham’s cases, the “interviewer” has a limited arsenal of solutions, namely his company’s products and services, most of which are well described both in terms of technical/operational aspects and price. In TT cases, where the TT Offer is not a fully developed technology, there will always be questions concerned with whether the suggested Offer will work in real life. If there is only theoretical evidence or a simple prototype, how can I convince a businessman that my Offer will work, since I often have no clear evidence that the prototype can be made into an operational production item without excessive cost? In such cases there will often be a need to actually carry out pilot projects to test the Offer. It is clear that communication between the parties will suffer from the fact that the pilot project must be funded – who should pay? The risk is, in other words, higher for TT. Furthermore, the risk profile for TT also includes the potential business of the Offer once it is introduced into the market.

In summary, I find it useful to apply Neil Rackham’s insights as guidelines for Best Practise Standards in Beef Communication. Later in this course, we shall see how this can be done in practise.

(XiX) Siemens' Future Study

Some time ago, I reported on British Telecom's Future Studies Group and their Technology Timeline. Now Siemens Corporate Technology Department has made a road map of the Future in six areas of interest.

Siemens' Future Study

    With its "Pictures of the Future" approach,  Siemens takes a long look into the future: 10, 20 or even 30 years, depending upon the area of activity. The goal is to identify promising technologies and future consumer wishes and to discover new business possibilities. The result is a coherent vision of tomorrow's world.

(1) Beef Practice

On this blog I have two types of entries. In Roman numerals (I,II etc) I discuss certain concepts and methods (Good Practices),w hich the TT practitioner should be familiar with. The straight numerals (1,2 ...) concern practical examples and cases and have exercises related to them.

Enough of concepts, methods and tricks. How do we apply all of this? Let’s take some examples:
I normally start with the “Technology” and then zoom in on Market, Company and Persons – and do so in an iterative fashion. The result is a file or dossier on the case, residing in your mind, on your computer hard disk and in your web browsers bookmarks.

The first thing to do is to find out: What is it? We may think we know what a truck trailer is, or can imagine what a method for remediation of sewage water is. But do you know what a “chiral compound for heteroaromatic bis-amides” is? Or can a plant extract be useful to fight cancer? How about nanotubes? Do you what legionella is? Whatever the challenge, I always check definitions:

• use JBEngine’s “What is it” Finder or its “Keyword Finder”
• use Kartoo, other “mindmap” search engines
• Use Google: images (and now video), News etc.

In the process you will save a few documents, bookmark a few web sites, make a few notes.

In the early check, you also need to ask What does it do (function of the invention)? And what do alternatives do? Now, we are getting to “prior art”. These questions relate to the next question: why should someone/we change from existing practice to using the invention? So we are trying to establish the Good part. I use

• JBEngine’s “Technology” Interface and use many of the submenus. You will soon learn to create complex search strings, building upon JBEngine’s already quite complex starters. Don’t insist on understanding all immediately. Don’t spend more than one hour at the most. You’ll come back to the question later.
• Check patent databases. Here I use their Advanced Search facilities. The keywords you use, you get from the What is it? notes, but you will want to improve your keyword list as you iterate. You may even want to go back and check your What is it? list. Use the tricks to mine the databases, paste your search results into Excel or Word; then sort and find out who the assignees are. There are three typical possibilities: either the inventors themselves, their institutions/universities or a company. I check the latest 50 or 100 whichever covers the latest 4-5 years best.
• Think Value Innovation Chart. Try to think of “parameters of comparison”. This information is normally buried in the inventor’s presentation, in terms of claims of superior functionality. Then try to think of how much better the invention may be or should be. Draw a preliminary chart.
• If the information is not in the inventor’s presentation, either ask him/her to go home and do it and/or interview them immediately. But don’t rely totally on their answer. Most inventors have lost overview, have fallen in love with their subject matter. Stopped looking for the competition years ago. What does that imply? Quite often that you should be patient, don’t tell the inventor that you know the above, but then slowly try to get to the core (“peel the onion”) of the matter. I play stupid: “I don’t understand. Please explain this to me in a different manner”. Please make a drawing with me, I say. I have an example of a Value Chart and ask them to help build the case for their invention.
• Earlier, I explained that there two alternatives. Either the invention does the same function in the same way as  prior art, but more efficiently or in some other advantageous (and ask, for whom?) way- this is the functional substitution part. Or the invention solves the same problem as prior art, but in a substantially different way – this is substantial substitution. Classify the invention in these categories.

(XI) Where's the (Horse) Beef?

Multi-criteria decision-making tools (MCDM)
In view of the deficiency of economist method, another body of thinking has developed, for instance in operations analysis, ending up with alternative methods referred to as multi-criteria decision-making tools (MCDM). They are multi-criteria in contract to econometric theory’s single criterion: money. John Friend and Allan Hickling’s book is one of the best and most pragmatic books on the topic of MCDM, and they have even built a software tool to support their method. If you search the web, you’ll find a host of competing projects and tools, so have your choice.

John Friend and Allan Hickling
With the above mentioned elements of TIM, we try to create a toolkit. A toolkit is a container with different tools, which fit our purpose. I have already mentioned that I have little confidence in economic theory and methods in our profession. I shall refrain from a theoretical debate, but ask you to read John Friend and Allan Hickling’s excellent book on ”Strategic Planning Approach” in which they start with a good discussion of the ”philosophical” background.. " 

We could say that the economist’s methods has only one tool and container, namely money. I -with many others- insist that we know too little about the numerical parameters of our opportunities, so we are forced to make assumptions about time ranges (what will the interest rate be over the next 10 years? What will the profit margin be in a given industry?). Try and read Ian Pearson’s interesting book: Business 2010 (see later) – and you’ll know what I mean! See the entry about Technology Timeline here on this weblog

Statisticians will tell you that when you do so, you increase the margin of insecurity in the power of prediction of your economic model. When you start to multiply and combine several such parameters, the precision of the model is lost – and the purpose of the exercise defeated. Furthermore, if we talk about something, which is truly new, how – from a philosophical point of view – can we say anything relevant about customer behaviour, readiness to pay etc. – other than gestimates? In my slide show I have some good examples of how poorly many well known businesses were ”capitalized” when they reached the market place.

In another  wording, I suggest that horse-betting is easier or less risky than investing in new technology. With horse-races, we normally know who the actors are, we even get experts’ words concerning the odds for success. We also know the race-track, can foresee (weather) conditions etc. Compared to this, in betting on an invention we don’t know who the actors are, who the competitors might be, on which race-ground the race is to take place. In a way, the good practitioner attempts to increase his/her insight into an opportunity, so it becomes equal to the horse-betters.

Common (Business) Sense
However, the use of the methods I suggest does require some common sense of what business is and means. Business methods and perspectives have changed a lot over the last 20 years, so this cannot be learnt from a textbook or via courses like ours. The practitioner on a learning curve must try and try so as to develop his/her own ”gut feeling” for what works and what doesn’t.

For instance, one of COAP’s dimensions is ”ease of access to the market”, but what does this mean? Which sector is more monopolistic: the automobile industry or the power industry? I don’t think there is an objective answer to this question. The trained better at horse-races knows how to piece together his jigsaw before he puts his bet; the same goes for commercial appraisal of inventions.

(XX) Confidentiality

Confidentiality and Disclosure
I work with many research groups around the world. I see a lot of poor management of confidential material, which in principle damages the commercial use of an invention. I  devote a number of preaching sessions to TOs and researchers to think about what they do. The never ending list of breaches could start here

• I enter offices, shared by many, where confidential reports, letters, patent applications etc lie around- often in piles. Students, visitors etc come and go. Not good enough. Get a locked drawer at least.
• Computers with confidential material are accesible to passers-by. Terrible. Password protection is a must. Better: don't store any confidential information on networked PCs. Use Collaborative Software.
• Most use e-mail to manage their correspondence with fellow scientists, send confidential results, documents etc. Read this Blog about The Bad in Email or see why you should use Collaborative Software.
• Very few keep track of their correspondence. Good scientists log their experiments. Once you have started inventive work which might involve commercialization, then immediately create a log with details of who does what, when etc and who gets what when etc.
• Many grant funding authorities (governments) demand copies of research reports with confidential information. Wait to file here until you have filed your patent. Make sure that the authority manages confidentiality! Check what they do- ask them.
• In many experiments you get the help of advanced technology suppliers (microscopes, biological material, special materials etc). if you give them critical (to your future IP) specifications, make sure they sign a Confidentiality Agreement, before you enter into collaboration.
• Many projects and experiments are done with and by students, who are not part of the inventors' group, Make sure they are under non-disclosure regime.

I'll follow up on this awfully important topic.

(XiX) Technology Timeline

Technology Timeline
British Telecom futurology guru Ian Pearson has convinced me that we need to think not only of concepts and methods.

In a time of rapid technology change and other technology-related development trends, we need to have a view on(an understanding of)  what is coming and how it may change the way we know business. Pearson has co-authored an excellent book called “Business 2010” – read it and start wondering.

At BT he and his colleagues have built a wonderful graphical interface to show you what they mean!
The Technology Timeline supports my point that we may not get much guidance about the future of a certain market by looking backwards, not even into the immediate past. It teaches us to keep a critical distance to the sources about and from the past (which is all sources, by definition!).

Important Technology Change: the next Industrial Revolution
For ther near future, I recommend that you get acquainted with nanotechnology, which represents the next industrial revolution: it will greatly affect and change the scientific and technological base of almost any industry or sector. I have made my own Nano-blog, as have many other good bloggers. Use your RSS feed reader to find them. Or use my Nano-Rollyo to search good nano-sites.

(XVIII) Patent Class Analysis

Patent Class Analysis
A special set of sources is patent databases. Sources such as esp@cenet, WIPO, USPTO are really useful. I use a method of quickly browsing these databases in regard to a given invention or company and then collect information about the competition, “prior art” etc. This involves using your internet browser, a good spreadsheet, a good database and how to jump around in these applications to quickly get you the overview which is so critical for “Where’s the Beef”.

It's amazing how much information there is in such files. The key to using them in practice is to employ methods which will allow you to quickly form an opinion. Once you have spotted a Patent Class or a Search Pattern which suits your needs and clients, then you should try to subscribe to these saved searches. There are many ways. WIPO allows you to subscribe to RSS which is a really useful method.

I generally believe Microsoft's products are not very useful. The Office series is of great help for patent mining, if you do it right. I show some tricks.

Once you have spotted patents, classes or other patterns in your findings, you'll find references to important persons, companies, prior art links etc. This information is really important for quick-and-dirty judgements.

(XVII) Where's the Beef: Search tricks II

Search the Right Places II: Knowledge Management Tricks
Building “Where’s the Beef” models takes practice and there is a lot of tricks which may make life much easier for you. In the clinic I normally give  advice and tips & tricks about how to take -cheap- shortcuts (you can buy many/most information and get poor in the process. Question is: will you also get richer?):

• Which patent databases to use and how to mine them. JBEngine does the start; the rest is up to you.
• How to find specific case material about the “value chain”. JBEngine is powerful.
• How to use indirect sources of information such as Edgar SEC filings, to get information of a whole industry. Because of the paranoic legal situation for “publicly traded” corporations, i.e. on the stcok exchange, there is no limit to what upper management discloses about their own business, and thereby the competition.
• Brainstorm keywords from different perspectives. Mindmapping, functional/substantial substitution; laguage versions (English is not the –only- world language).
• How to use mindmap search engines such as Kartoo
• How to use the new RSS/xml standards (Web 2!) to monitor certain sources of information in specific terms.
• How to “Roll” your own search engine (pack) with software such as Rollyo (mainly Yahoo). Use TII’s search pages as well.
• How to use “indexing” to store and find “value chain relevant” past findings: Copernic for PC; Spotlight for Mac
• How to build Knowledge Management "libraries" which cover prior work but prepares for future work with the same group of/type of researchers.
• How to screen sources
• How to mine sources
• How not to trust the Internet and how to distinguish when (Advanced Cell...)

In later articles I shall cover each of these topics.

(XVI) Jacob Bar: Help me

Jacob Bar: Help me
With the Internet and databases it has become so much easier to find many of the answers to the above questions, to “populate” our models. ”Google It”, many TO practitioners now would say. That’s fine, but the problem is that the Internet (data and its complexity) is growing at an enormous speed and indexing is not keeping pace. It’s hard to choose what to believe when you ”Google It”. The advantage of Internet searching is that it puts an emphasis on the need for links, and that the practitioner must jump from one to another piece of information to patch together a final verdict. Don’t believe the first hit(s).

Jacob Bar, an Israeli gentleman with many years of experience in the theory of natural language and as special advisor to the Israeli Minister of Science & Technology, has developed a search engine, which is particularly well adapted to the needs of the TO practitioner. Jacob, who is a also a lover of good jokes, has called his engine: JbhelpMe.com or the Jbengine.

Jacob says that he has looked at the way we pose questions, when we do commercial appraisal and has reduced the multitude of questions to a few hundred ”natural language” queries. In a sense, he has qualified or multiplied the 10 dimensions of COAP (and other good business planning tools) by asking many more detailed questions.

Secondly, Jbengine searches not only the Internet, the few billion html-pages (and other protocols) which are publicly available via browsers. His engine also looks into certain Extranet sources, the large reservoir of ”internal” databases of different organizations. This gives the user exceptional search power of 700+ billion pages and also power to get to the core faster. This area of search changes its nature rapidly, so this verdict may be outdated in a few months. You will find Extranet sources, but then you will to have to pay to get the real stuff: what you find is only the teaser. A good example is Mindbranch

Finally, JbhelpMe collects information relevant to my query and presents it in one package. So I get Google feedback alongside information links from other search engines. For example, a search concerns only whether a given, keyword matches one or more patents. Jbengine returns information from several patent databases in one window, so it gives me faster and better overview.

The only real problem with Jacob’s useful work is that it is not always updated. I will show you ways to work around that problem.

(XV) Where's the Beef: Search Engines

Search the right places
As per estimate in 2005, 5,000,000 terrabytes of information exist in the world, only 2-3% of which are currently indexed and searchable. Google CEO Schmidt's timing for when all of the world's information will be searchable?  300 years, according to a presentation he did in the summer of 2005.
Google indexes 3% per year, which doesn’t cover Extranet sources!! Clearly we need an engine which starts by looking the right places first.

So what to do about it? At the moment there is no plug-and-play solution. No one engine delivers what we want. There is a multitude of search engines and methods of using computers, which are necessary and helpful to the tech transfer practitioner.

The Good Search Engine searches not only the Internet, but also Extranet and in some cases, Intranets (requires “co-authentication”). The Good Engine uses experts to pre-select sites, known to be most relevant. Innovation & tech transfer professionals have to focus to be efficient. You will have to build your own subset of good sources for your line of business.

Each engine has its special language. And most users specify <5 keywords, when they search. What to do when we get for example 153,000 hits or more? The practitioner knows how to customize the Good Engine in terms of special templates, known to produce best results, and set up with 20-30 keywords and using Boolean language and other methods to focus the searches.

The Good Engine, customized as above, must deliver results in easily reviewable formats, not only with headlines and links, as is mostly the case at present.

WYSINWYG: What You See Is NOT What You Want to Get.  The right results may be down the pile behind the paid-for advertisers. Google and Yahoo are biased in their sorting, must be, it’s part of the algorithm (any system has a bias).  The problem(s) are many: normally much too many hits (imagine what it may be when it all is indexed!), and it’s  WYSINWYWG.

The Good Engine makes its own biases, confirmed by peers of the trade. The practical - and affordable- solution is to combine different approaches. One of the best available tools is JBEngine, available through TII Click here. I developed that website and have included some other good hints and sources for searching, including Rollyo, whic I shall review later . There are other good sources and tools, some of which are not fully integrated in JBEngine.