The Real Cost of Accurate IP Translations

For companies aspiring for global business, investing in accurate quality translations can potentially increase global IP protection and revenue, while reducing the overall cost of patent ownership.

With substantial growth in global patent activity, to and from Asian language markets, translation errors in patent applications have become more common.

Companies of all sizes and value the need to file patents in multiple jurisdictions to protect their IP, in the view of resulting global revenue these patents generate. When it comes to getting the quality translations of necessary documentation to file the patent in multiple foreign jurisdictions, many filers get the shock of life by the excessive costs and fear that this expense will likely to limit the scope of their filing strategy.

With more and more companies filing for patents globally, as per World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), the most patent applications are received for China, the United States and Japan. These countries are also home to the three languages recently reported as having the most patent errors related to translation.

How translation errors impact the cost of patents for companies? The cost of translation errors comes from:

• Long Wait for a patent to be granted due to office actions
• The hidden risk of an unenforceable patent
• Unexpected internal and external costs,
• Limiting the number of patents filed due to unexpected internal and external costs that exceed budget

And, this is a real problem which all companies face. Having accurate translations is imperative to limit the cost of accurate translations.

Need for Transition to a Streamlined Translation Model

The solution to this is developing a new model for defining and producing quality IP translations. A model that enables patent filers to better manage and reduce the overall cost of their patent portfolio, while improving scientific and legal accuracy as well.

A centralized and streamlined process for patent translation can be adopted, by both legal teams and patent translation service providers for ensuring quality and efficiency in patent translations. In this approach, the patent translation is managed by a translation company, with global operations centralized by use of technology solutions. This is performed at the beginning of the application process. This has several benefits:

• This allows law firms and foreign agents to focus on legal work only.
• Clients get quality translations from highly skilled and certified translators who are not only highly skilled in language, but also have technical expertise in the client's field of business.
• Clients are benefited from technology solutions that improve translation process, quality and security of their documents, and create efficiency over time with terminology management and translation memories.

Document Translation Services

Document translation services includes quality and accurate IP translations. After incorporating the best streamlined model for IP translations, the results of translation process and quality will show sign of:

• The elimination of translation and clarity-related office actions for clients
• Time advantage by achieving double the goal
• The company's total cost of patent ownership to be reduced by almost 30 percent

When you truly categorize and account for the real benefits, the costs of IP translations, as mentioned above, a streamlined model for translation makes the most sense for you regardless of your any size company.