Opinions & Portfolio Analysis
At Lempia Summerfield Katz, our seasoned IP attorneys deliver in-depth opinions and portfolio analyses to empower clients with strategic insight into their intellectual property assets. Whether you’re launching a new product or facing potential litigation, our legal evaluations are tailored to support your business objectives.
Strategic IP Insights and Risk Assessment
We offer comprehensive freedom-to-operate, patentability, and invalidity opinions that identify both obstacles and opportunities. By collaborating closely with your in-house team, we ensure that our analyses dovetail with your broader commercial strategy.
Clarity Before Commitment
Major business decisions—launching a product, acquiring a company, entering a new market—carry intellectual property implications that are far less costly to address before commitment than after. Our opinions and analyses are designed to give you clear, well-reasoned answers when they matter most, so you can move forward with confidence rather than uncertainty.
Opinions and Portfolio Analysis Services
Freedom-to-Operate Opinions
Pinpointing third-party patent risks prior to market entry.
Patentability Opinions
Assessing the novelty and patent eligibility of new inventions.
Invalidity Opinions
Scrutinizing competitor patents to challenge enforceability.
Portfolio Benchmarking
Comparing your IP holdings against industry leaders.
Why Choose Lempia Summerfield Katz?
- Deep Technical & Analytical Excellence
Our attorneys hold technical degrees and real-world engineering experience across complex industries. This technical fluency allows us to dissect prior art with exact precision, resulting in legal evaluations you can trust. - Actionable, Business-Centric Intelligence
We deliver clear, executive-level reporting that translates dense patent data into actionable business recommendations. Whether you are justifying an IP budget, seeking venture funding, or greenlighting a product launch, we give you the definitive answers you need. - Proactive Risk Mitigation & Planning
We don’t just tell you what the landscape looks like today; we prepare you for tomorrow. Our proactive strategies anticipate examiner pushback, identify opportunities to “design around” competitor patents, and clear a safe, profitable path to market for your innovations.
Opinions & Portfolio Analysis FAQ
A Patentability Opinion evaluates the likelihood your invention may be granted as a patent before you invest the time and budget into drafting and filing a formal application.
We conduct a thorough search of existing public technology ("prior art") and analyze your invention against it to determine if your idea is truly novel and non-obvious.
A patentability opinion may help you make an informed decision on whether to pursue a patent. If the field is too crowded, the opinion can save you money. If there is white space, the search results allow us to draft a stronger, more targeted patent application that anticipates and avoids the examiner's likely rejections.
A Freedom-to-Operate (FTO) Opinion (sometimes called a clearance opinion) assesses whether your proposed product, process, or service infringes on the active patent rights of others.
Before you launch a new product, invest heavily in manufacturing, or seek venture funding, we analyze the patent landscape in your target markets to identify any potential legal roadblocks.
FTOs are essential for risk mitigation. They help you avoid costly infringement litigation, provide the opportunity to "design around" competitor patents before production begins, and give investors the confidence that your commercial launch is legally clear.
- Patentability asks: "Can I get my own patent for this invention?"
- FTO asks: "If I make or sell this product, will I get sued for infringing someone else's patent?"
It is entirely possible to receive a patent for an improvement on an existing technology, but still not have the "freedom to operate" or sell that product because a competitor holds a broader, underlying patent. We help clients navigate both sides of this equation.
An Invalidity Opinion is a formal legal analysis concluding that a specific, issued patent is legally invalid and unenforceable (potentially because the patent examiner missed critical prior art during the original examination).
- The Strategic Value: We generally draft invalidity opinions as a defensive shield. If a competitor threatens your business with a patent infringement lawsuit, a strong invalidity opinion provides powerful leverage to neutralize the threat. Alternatively, it can be used offensively to clear a path if a weak competitor patent is blocking your business objectives.
Beyond providing strategic clarity, formal, written legal opinions from specialized patent counsel serve as a critical legal shield. For example, if you are ever sued for patent infringement, having a well-reasoned, formal FTO or Invalidity opinion in hand demonstrates that your company acted in good faith. This can protect your business from accusations of "willful infringement," which can result in a judge tripling the financial damages awarded against you.