With the increased interest in owning intellectual property, there is an ever-increasing number of deals being made to create, fund, buy, aggregate and spin off IP assets. At first, the belief is that this would not seem to create unusual problems because IP is an asset that can be bought and sold like any other asset. However, the reality is often different.
IP assets, especially patents and software, often have long and involved creative lives. One person may start a project; another person may contribute something on a consultancy basis; and yet another person may be responsible for bringing the project home. Although this is stated in the singular, it is just as common to have each of the various contributors be teams of people.
