Idea of the year

iPowow is an interactive media platform that gives television broadcasters, advertisers and content producers around the world the power to ask their viewers a question and have the whole audience respond instantly.

“As a startup you have trial and error and you do not know what will make money until you are some way through the process and the patent is public. If the patent is too specific you might not be able to protect the product”, said Peter Tippett, Chief Technology Officer of iPowow.

“The main thing we have learnt is, use a specialist at the start so you do not get caught out later. IP is everything when you start and it is important to get protection early so you can realise the full value of the business later on. POF were able to take iPowow's unique technology and express it as a clear patent, which in turn created a valuable asset for the company and it's investors”.

David Clark, Partner and head of POF's Sydney office has been working with iPowow to assist them with their IP needs since the beginning.  “We had a clear strategy that for the iPowow patent to have real value then it had to be broad. This can open you up to more challenges but the wider we could get it the better and they now have a jump on the market,” he said.

"David knew what we wanted and that is the value of a good patent attorney”, said Peter.