IPO accelerates digital services transformation plans

The Intellectual Property Office's 'One IPO' Transformation project launched in April this year and is set to ramp up this month as the first of their transformation projects - Manage IP - moves from its 'Discovery' phase to ‘Alpha’.

Manage IP is intended to be a single service where customers are able to view and manage all their intellectual property in one place, and also be able to change or update their personal information. As part of the Manage IP project the agency is also building the customer account, which is the gateway to the new services.

Acting on user feedback: what did IPO learn?

IPO's customers shared some key insights during the discovery phase:

• Different customers want to access IPO’s services in different ways. Some attorneys want to manage their IP through the IP software they already use. Others need to be able to delegate access to clients or colleagues and filter through large IP portfolios. Then there are the one-time IP filers who want it to be simple, quick and easy
• In the customer accounts, simple changes, like changing your address, should happen automatically without further checks. More complex changes, such as changing ownership of an IP right, should still need manual checks or approvals
• IPO needs to find a simple way for customers to link their existing IP to their new account. This is a process being referred to as ‘claim my right’. People don’t want to enter lots of information about their rights when they register, so IPO is thinking about how this could work

Manage IP project: Alpha priorities

IPO has now entered the Alpha phase for this transformation project, and the organisation will start building and testing the parts of the service that are most challenging.

Current work involves building the prototypes to test and trial features of the new service. This includes building an end-to-end customer transaction, like changing an address and testing the customer account to work out what information different customers need to see. There will also be an exploratory look at how the process of giving access to others (eg a paralegal or a client) could work.

Other work commencing this month includes testing ideas for how IPO will marry up customer accounts with the IP they own. As they don’t currently have all the data required to automate this process, they are looking how to do this without placing too much of a burden on customers. IPO is also looking at using Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) to allow customers to send data to IPO via their own IP management software.

Secure IP project

In September IPO also started their second transformation project – Secure IP, where customers can do everything involved in securing their IP rights. This includes applying for it, examination and registration or granting of IP rights. As with the Manage IP project, IPO will be starting this with a discovery phase. This will allow the agency to determine what customers need from this part of the service.

You can read the full One IPO Transformation prospectus here.