• What are the technical strengths of my competitors and how do they threaten my products or services?
• What additional features/services can my competitor offer which could further threaten my position?
• What are my competitors’ weaknesses and how can I exploit them?
• What opportunities exist in my own product or services which I haven’t yet exploited?

At TechSys Insights, we have many years of requirements, architecture, design, and implementation experience throughout the development cycle. We recognize that all solutions have strengths and weaknesses, opportunities and threats, resulting from the myriad tradeoff decisions made throughout the development process.

We offer competitive intelligence studies which identify unique product attributes bringing clarity to an often complex and confusing technical area. This enables our customers to exploit the weaknesses of competing solutions and to identify and exploit new opportunities in their own products.

• How does this technology work compared to other solutions?
• How well does this device or sub-system fit into my overall product strategy?
• How well does this software work and has it been fully tested?
• Does it offer all the advantages that I need?

TechSys Insights offers Technology Evaluation studies to boost the productivity of these engineering teams. We conduct focused industry literature and patent research and provide a condensed, plain English, summation. This has three main benefits:

1. It speeds up the requirements, architecture or design cycle by allowing engineers a more efficient, focused approach to solving design issues.
   
2. It guards against un-intentional infringements that can occur when everyone is trying to solve the same problems at the same time.
   
3. The summation can speed the patent process for your innovations since it constitutes a prior art study.

• Have I identified all intellectual property in my company and what value does it offer?
• Do I know where it is and on what products or services it is being used?
• Are there holes in my current portfolio that could be turned into opportunities; either offensive or defensive?
• Am I monitoring my intellectual assets appropriately? Is there anyone out there using my IP without my knowing it?
• Do I understand which of my intellectual assets give me the biggest bang for my buck? How are they tied to specific products?
• Which assets are no longer core to my business? Could such assets be of value to someone else, thus offering me additional revenue?
• Can I reduce expenses by no longer paying maintenance fees for assets that are no longer core to my business and which offer little opportunity for licensing?
• How do I know that I don’t infringe inadvertently?
• How well does a potential partners IP compliment our portfolio?
• Does a potential acquisition benefit our IP portfolio?

Intangible assets include intellectual property; specifically patents, trademarks, copyrights, and trade secrets, as well as other intellectual capital like customer lists, supplier lists, marketing strategies, business, manufacturing, and development processes.

Most companies consider many of these intangible assets as the cost of doing business. Although active intellectual capital management has the potential to contribute to increased revenues, reduced expenses, risk mitigation, effective protection and strategic alliances most companies do not have active management programs for exploiting this unique potential.