Trading in patents: Italian institute seeks data -- can you help?

The IP Finance Institute is the unit of the Italian University Politecnico di Torino which focuses on the economics and financial aspects of intellectual property. As a non-profit organization, the IP Finance Institute promotes and develops know-how transfer, research initiatives and projects relating to IP as an economic asset and its use in IP-based financing solutions.

One of the Institute's current research projects seeks to shed light on the dynamics of patent transactions, on the rationale behind the use of marketplaces for IP rights and, in particular, on the reasons for selling patents by auction. Part of this project has been structured to discover how the issue is perceived by the involved companies.

To this end, the Institute has composed an online survey designed for representatives of companies which actively trade patents (in particular at auctions), in order to collect direct evidence. Participants can access the questionnaire -- which is in Engliah -- by clicking this link.

The survey is expected to take approximately 10 minutes. All of the submitted data will be treated anonymously and in aggregated form for academic research goals and will not be transferred to any third party. At the end of the project the results will be shared with all the participants and will be published.