The BBC’s Dragons’ Den show is one that many IP lawyers love. We live in a “mysterious” world that many, including the mainstream media, do not understand so it is good to see the hard work we do in the background being appreciated by the entrepreneurs and the dragons.

This last week, we were lucky to see one of our clients, Cordina Ltd, obtain investment into their business and this investment was very much off the back of the intellectual property obtained: trade marks, registered designs and patents.

It is a useful reminder to small businesses that may see intellectual property as an unnecessary cost. It provides you with a tool that can be used to stop other parties. It is extremely attractive to investors so they can see you have tools to protect the value of your brand, any new technical inventions and/or the new appearance of a product. In a way, they are an insurance package that can be used to stop infringing third parties, but they are also a business asset that you can sell, license or use as security on a loan.

Not all businesses will have all forms of intellectual property, but it is extremely unlikely that any business will have none of them whatsoever.

When it comes to registered intellectual property rights, trade marks and registered designs are not prohibitively expensive. We, nonetheless, appreciate that when a business is starting out, a cost of a few hundred pounds isn’t a drop in the ocean. For hobby businesses, IP may be unrealistic, but any serious entrepreneurs are urged to consider protection. If you think a trade mark is registered for a period of 10 years, dividing the costs by 10 can make the numbers feel palatable.

At Stobbs, we are fortunate enough to work for a number of large household names, but it’s a pleasure to work with smaller brands and new entrepreneurial businesses to protect their IP in a cost-effective manner. Some of the common areas where we work with budding businesses are with searching and registering trade marks, protecting registered designs and the drafting of non-disclosure Agreements and other contracts that can protect intellectual assets. We also work with our partners at EIP in relation to patent protection.

We urge businesses of all shapes and sizes to consider protecting their intellectual property. Ideally, it will never need to be enforced, but it may give you the platform to £1000s from Deborah, Tej or Touker or another angel investor!