IP Value/ Xerox Case Study

Dr. Kasznik different IP strategies and that IP strategy can determine a product’s success, market share, and profitability.  Her slide states that case studies demonstrate that a failure to address IP issues can result in a loss of market share, margin erosion, and reduced market competitiveness. One case study I found quite interesting and surprising regards parc. Parc is a Xerox company that is known for using the GUI, or graphical user interface first, however they did not patent it. They used it in 1979 and the Xerox management did not believe it would be valuable at that time in the small PC market. This resulted in a potential loss of royalty revenues from Mac and Windows sales that estimated around half a billion dollars. From this incident we learn that although something might seem useless or obsolete at the time could become powerful or very useful in the future. Dr. Kasznik reminds us that failure to patent results of innovative research can lead to large financial and strategic losses.

This is an illustration of the parc gui below: 

I felt that this was useful because many aspiring Berkeley students have probably contemplated participating in a start-up, but many of them do not know that IP strategy could help keep them afloat.