Ideas Powered for Business - interest from professional IP experts
The Ideas Powered for Business SME Fund is a €20 million grant scheme created to help European small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) develop their IP strategies and protect their IP rights, at national, regional or EU level. The scheme is operated by the EUIPO in conjunction with the national IP Offices. A scheme (Service 2) which provides for the reimbursement of 50% off the basic application fees of national, regional and EU trade marks and designs is already in operation.
The Intellectual Property Office of Ireland (IPOI) is now seeking expressions of interest from professional IP experts and attorneys who can provide an intellectual property (IP) pre-diagnostic service (Service 1) to small or medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Ireland. The IPOI is anxious for Irish SMEs to be able to avail of this scheme by summer 2021. The pre-diagnostic service or IP scan is aimed at providing a practical, objective and factual analysis of an SMEs business model, products and/or services and growth plans to help achieve a better understanding of the value of intellectual property for a business and, in particular, to identify the intellectual assets they hold and the possible IP protection options for those assets. It should also assist in shaping and planning an enterprises IP business strategy now - and in the future.
The scheme is co-financed by the European Commission (under the EU programme for the Competitiveness of Enterprises and Small and Medium-sized Enterprises) and the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) under the SME Fund initiative. An SME will be able to claim 75% of the fees paid by them to an IPOI approved expert for the pre-diagnosis IP Scan service. Each SME can be reimbursed up to a maximum total of €1,500 for either Service 1 or Service 2 or a combination of both services
The role of the IPOI will be to coordinate the provision of the IP Scan Service (Service 1) as well as confirming its completion for reimbursement purposes. The service will be provided by an IP pre-diagnostic expert (allocated by the IPOI). The expert will provide a report outlining its findings on the SMEs’ IP rights and proposing recommendations for the future management of the IP rights owned by the SME. The IPOI is required to approve and sign off on the report which will be used by the SME to prove that the service was provided, when requesting reimbursement of the payment made to the expert. As the sponsoring body for this initiative, the EUIPO requires that experts intending to participate in the scheme would first attend an online training event organised by them. Further information on this will be supplied in advance.
Further information on the overall scheme can be accessed via this link:
Please send expressions of interest to: ipinfo@ipoi.gov.ie by 15 April 2021. Please include relevant information concerning your expertise in providing this kind of service and what fee (rate per hour and per day inclusive and exclusive of VAT) you will charge for the service. Enquiries or requests for further information should be sent to: ipinfo@ipoi.gov.ie with “SME Fund” in the subject line.