t's disappointing to hear of the apparent demise of the German Patent exploitation company IP Bewertung run by Guido von Scheffer from Hamburg. The company filed for bankruptcy in July and had made a name for itself for taking ideas and attempting to convert them into marketable technologies. Unlike many patent exploitation companies, IP Bewertung - which means Intellectual Property Valuation in English - realised that it was going to be difficult to take and market patents by themselves. The ideas needed nurturing into marketable technologies and they used to pride themselves in such investments in developing the technology.
The strategy seems not to have paid off since both IP Bewertung AG and the holding company IPB Holding AG have filed for insolvency in the local court in Hamburg.
It'll be interesting to see what becomes of the Deutsche Bank Patent Funds set up in 2006 and 2007 and reported here (in German). The funds still exist - and no doubt have some potential. The universities and research institutes who entrusted the commercialisation of their ideas to IPB will also be wondering whether they will ever receive a return.
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