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Case Study: Management of Professional Advisers

Product/Service Area: Management of Professional Advisers

This company was a start up university spin-out in clinical trials for a new line of drugs.  It had used a number of professional advisers from the inception of the business covering legal, finance and patents.  All the advisers communicated directly with the founder of the business who was performing the dual functions of CEO and CTO.  As a result, workflow did not allow sufficient time to supervise the professional advisers with respect to the detail of the work being conducted on the company’s behalf, or the cost. Some of the advisers were on monthly retainers that were unrelated to the volume of work actually being delivered.

It was found essential, particularly for a small business such as this, to have a senior member of the management team responsible for ensuring that instructions to the professional advisers were appropriately executed.  This member of staff had a key role in reporting to management on these relationships, which was found to be particularly important in relation to company secretarial matters, fundraising and company communications with shareholders.

In relation to intellectual property and particularly patents, it was found essential that there should be a proper understanding between the company and the patent agents regarding the details of the invention being patented.  A particular issue was selection of an agent with relevant expertise in respect of the particular technology being patented.  Likewise, the patent agent needed to have the ability to advise management of relevant strategic patent issues in terms of territorial patent coverage and the level of difficulty in completing the patent application process.  These issues were found to be key aspects of the decision-making process concerning commercialisation of the product and the associated costs.  It was recommended that the client company switch patent agents and following a formal selection process, a new patent agent was appointed.