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Webdyn – Integrating ICT Creates Solutions For The Internet Of Things
By Pierre Ollivier Webdyn is a EUR 4 million revenue company which was created and funded by early investors in 1997, with additional financing by venture capitalists in 2010. Located in Paris and with an export office in India, it currently has 30 employees. Its core business is to help industrial clients—mainly in the smart […]
Fractus – Snowflake Pattern Precipitates New Application For Antennae
By Philippe Simon Factus was co-founded in 1999 by Rubén Bonet, its president and CEO, and Carles Puente Baliarda. It originally positioned itself as a products and services company, developing customised antennae for leading smartphone manufacturers (Samsung, LG, Siemens) and network operators (Telefonica). The firm was in consolidation phases until 2002. During this time it […]
Ekspla – Leveraging IP: From Research Tools To Industry Applications
By Christian Hackl EKSPLA, a Lithuanian SME set up in 1992, started off supplying customised high-performance laser systems to scientific laboratories. It later extended its product range to standardised laser systems for industrial applications. The move to producing standardised lasers made IP more important. EKSPLA now owns twelve patent families. In addition, some of its […]
Orcan Energy – Recycling Waste Heat To Cool Down The Planet
By Christian Hackl Orcan Energy is a renewable energy company founded in 2008 by three researchers—Richard Aumann, Andreas Sichert and Andreas Schuster—as a spin-off from the Technical University of Munich (TUM). Today the company has 65 employees (2013: 35). Despite its international business reach, the company is still based in Munich, where it is firmly […]
Skeleton – Graphene Draws On Capacity For Energy Storage
By Anton Svensson and Bowman Heiden Skeleton offers one of the first commercialised technologies to use graphene, a ground-breaking and Nobel prize-winning material. This Estonian company develops, manufactures and sells ultracapacitor energy storage cells, modules and systems based on patented advanced materials and designs. Its IP portfolio has been created to protect the company’s technology […]
Voltea – Capacitance Creates A Watershed In Purification
By Arnaud Gasnier Voltea offers products, software for data/system control, services for online data tracking and integrated solutions for softening and deionising water. Most water impurities are in the form of dissolved salt that can be removed by deionisation. The process, which can be done quickly and inexpensively using electro-deionisation, produces high-purity water.
Lithoz – 3D Printing Opens Up A New Chapter For Ceramics
By Karin Hofmann Lithoz is an additive manufacturing company that has developed patentable methods and formulas for fabricating high-performance ceramic products with industrial applications that could not have been realised using traditional technologies. It has created 3D printers, a variety of new ceramic materials and dedicated software for printing production. Before the development of the […]
Picote – Pipe Repairs That Break The Rules But Not The Walls
By Arnaud Gasnier and Anton Svensson A traditional construction and renovation contractor, the Finnish company Picote discovered and filled a niche when it developed a proprietary method of repairing smaller interior pipes without drilling or digging. With 15 years of business expertise, it designed and developed materials, tools and methods to adapt an existing lining […]
SME Patent Strategies For IoT-Based Business Models
By Alexander Wurzer, Theo Grünewald, Wolfgang Fischer and Axel Karl The phenomena subsumed under the keywords of “fourth industrial revolution” and “Internet of Things” (IoT) is transforming the industrial landscape. With business models in the B2C and B2B segments adapting to these developments, the role of IP—and in particular that of patents—as a competitive instrument […]
The Unitary Patent System From An SME’s Perspective
By Klaus Haft Today, patents in Europe provide for national protection on a country-by-country basis. For the future, a Unitary Patent with unitary effect throughout the territory of the participating Member States is under preparation, which will co-exist with today’s system. To enter into force, among others the Agreement on a Unified Patent Court (UPCA) […]
