Managing Outside Counsel Costs, Cycle-time, and Quality Best Practices Benchmark

Law firm expenses represent most companies’ largest portion of the IP Law Department budget.  With continued economic pressures, IP Law Department leadership seeks to find new ways to manage increasing costs and operate more efficiently while improving the effectiveness of their patent assets.

The Intellectual Property Law Department: Outside Counsel Costs, Cycle-time, and Quality Management study confirms that law firm management varies widely across companies, but there are best practices for managing law firm relationships to achieve high-quality results, timely responses, and lower costs.

The Intellectual Property Outside Counsel Management topics covered include the following:

• Costs for patent-related activities
• Cycle times for patent procurement
• Effective methods to improve outside counsel results
• Outside counsel guideline structures
• Fee arrangements and cost and quality impact