Harvesting External Innovation: Managing External Relationships and Intellectual Property

Harvesting External Innovation addresses the growing phenomenon of companies cooperating and collaborating with a variety of external parties. Intellectual property, especially patents, plays a fundamental role promoting and protecting innovation, regardless of whether that innovation comes from internal employees or persons external to the company. Donal O'Connell discusses in depth how best to handle intellectual property matters, how to actually work with external inventors and how to handle their inventions. It includes a suggested process and check list.

About the Author

Donal O'Connell is Adjunct Professor at Imperial College Business School and the Owner and Managing Director of Chawton Innovation Services Ltd, offering consultancy, coaching and training in the areas of innovation and intellectual property management. A former Director of Intellectual Property Rights at Nokia, he has a long and varied experience in the global wireless telecommunications industry, having worked for periods in UK, USA, Finland, and Hong Kong. Donal graduated from the National Institute of Higher Education, Limerick, Ireland, with a Degree in Electronic Engineering. Donal has already published one book on patent creation called 'Inside the Patent Factory', (Wiley & Sons, 2008).