Euclid Discoveries manages its geographically dispersed workforce through a custom-tailored web-based intranet and a Task Management System (TMS) application. Every hour of engineer and researcher work is documented carefully, in a searchable and cross referenced database.  Collaboration and handoff of tasks are greatly assisted by the documentation process.

 

The intranet site (Euclid Knowledge Portal) allows staff to collaborate via a secure web-based portal which includes content management, workflow management, forums, and integration into the TMS system.

 

The TMS application has evolved from providing daily task assignment and management into a patent generation and intellectual property (IP) management facility. Information based on completed tasks is combined to create IP modules. The complex claim dependencies contained in a patent application can be modeled and together with the IP modules, can be used to create patent applications.

 

Once a patent application is created or entered into the system, reference links exist that provide drill down background capability. For example, for a particular paragraph in a patent application, supporting IP modules can be displayed down to the daily engineering log level. Management of the IP inter-dependencies between patent applications allows for easy management of multiple patents and thousands of IP modules.

 

These two tools, combined with a disciplined methodology, allow Euclid to address the problems of IP and resource management that many companies face today.  These tools have been instrumental in allowing a small team to manage a large set of IP assets.