New Company – Idea Successful Launch: Don’t Overlook Intangibles

Michael D. Moberly       June 4, 2008

There are many different views about what it takes to sustain a successful launch-commercialization of a new company, its ideas or products.

Obviously, having a very commercializable product and sufficient capital to execute a well researched business plan and marketing strategy represent some traditional ingredients necessary for most successful launches.

An often overlooked – underestimated ingredient to sustaining a successful business-idea launch though is recognizing that:

     75+% of the value, sources of revenue, and future wealth creation of the launching company will likely evolve from intertwined combinations of intangible assets, intellectual property, specialized proprietary know how and competitive advantages and brand integrity!

But, unlike patents, trademarks, and/or copyrights, the USPTO does not issue, to the launching company, a certificate that says, these are your intangible assets, proprietary know how, trade secrets, competitive advantages, and brand integrity.

Instead, the responsibility for recognizing those assets exist and unraveling how they individually – collectively contribute to – convert as value, revenue, and future wealth lie solely with the launching companies’ decision makers, as does protecting, preserving, monitoring (e.g., sustaining control, use, ownership) and effectively exploiting and/or leveraging the assets’ value.

Today’s hyper-competitive go fast, go hard, go global business environment may not always leave sufficient time for decision makers to reflect on and/or budget for these important ingredients.  They are, nevertheless, instrumental in the sustainability of successful launches.  Continuing to hedge (neglect) the assets essential maintenance (e.g., protect, preserve, monitor their use, ownership, and value) can cause risk-threat probabilities to become inevitabilities in which complete or partial (asset) value erosion-dilution is likely to occur, which in turn, creates parameters-boundaries to a companies’ economic-competitive position capabilities and potential.