Timeline
16 weeks
Team
5 engineers + 1 PM
Client
Research Institution
The Problem
Research institutions managed their entire IP lifecycle, from invention disclosure through drafting, approvals, filing, and post-filing tracking, across scattered tools, spreadsheets, and email threads. Researchers, admins, and attorneys had no shared source of truth, and compliance exports were painful.
Our Approach
Stakeholder Mapping (Weeks 1 to 3)
Ran sessions with researchers, tech-transfer admins, and external patent attorneys to map the lifecycle end-to-end and identify the friction points each role hit.
Disclosure Drafting AI (Weeks 4 to 7)
Built a guided disclosure experience that helps researchers articulate their invention, with AI assistance on technical claims, prior art context, and commercial framing.
Triage & Market Insights (Weeks 8 to 11)
Layered in AI evaluation of Technology Readiness Level (TRL), market sizing via external data sources, and prior-art similarity checks.
Attorney Workflows & Compliance (Weeks 12 to 16)
Shipped secure document exchange, filing status tracking, audit trails, and single-click compliance exports aligned with institutional reporting requirements.
The Solution
We built a unified AI-powered platform that digitizes every stage of the IP lifecycle. Generative AI assists with invention disclosure drafting, patent triage, and compliance checks. AI-generated insights on Technology Readiness Level, market size, and market value help researchers prioritize what to commercialize. Premium analytics and secure document handling support attorney workflows end-to-end.
Why This Tech Stack
Django gave us rapid iteration on complex workflow state machines and permissions. Azure OpenAI handled both structured outputs (for triage scoring) and free-form drafting assistance in the same system, which kept the architecture simple.
The Outcome
Centralized the entire IP lifecycle for the institution, replacing fragmented workflows with a single collaborative platform. Researchers, admins, and attorneys now work from shared data, and the AI-generated market insights became a key input for commercialization decisions.
Key Metrics
−65%
Invention disclosure time
2.4× capacity
Filings processed per attorney
4 wks → 1 wk
Commercialization decision speed
2 days → 2 hours
Compliance audit prep time