DLA Piper Report Addresses The Challenges Of Valuing, Protecting and Exploring Digital Assets
Scotland — DLA Piper has today launched the third part of a significant piece of qualitative research, which takes an in-depth look at the hotly debated topics of piracy and the disruptive impact of digital technology and analyses how businesses are responding to these challenges in order to protect and exploit their digital assets: http://www.dlapipershiftinglandscapes.com/.
‘Shifting Landscapes - the online challenge to traditional business models’, combines in-depth interviews with business leaders from organisations at the forefront of web-enabled innovation - including Random House, Nokia, Sony Music and Warner Brothers - with extensive secondary research and analysis.
Shifting Landscapes is a three part report which looks at:
• The development of online channels to market
• The impact of cloud computing
• The challenge of valuing, protecting and exploiting digital assets
Part three - digital assets, which launches today, addresses the challenge of how businesses first identify their digital assets and then value, protect and monetise them. It includes insight from business leaders, including Ian Grant who shares his experience at Encyclopaedia Britannica: “We struggled at first because we published all our material online for free - the idea was to get revenue from selling advertising space. However, millions of people looked at it and we didn’t know how to monetise the traffic. Within a year, we had done a handbrake turn and changed our offering into a subscription product”.
The report also addresses the challenges that the current legal framework poses. James Waterworth from Nokia points out: “The lawmakers and policymakers have to live with multi-jurisdictional fact, rather than trying to ignore it. There is a danger that policymakers will say ‘It’s multi-jurisdictional and I can’t control it, so therefore I must fragment the internet. Then I can control my bit, and others will control their bit.”
John McKinlay, head of DLA Piper Scotland’s Intellectual Property and Technology Group, said: “Technology has totally transformed the routes to market for business, allowing companies to operate across many continents and jurisdictions.
“With the dramatic increase in the size of the market have come significant new challenges, such as how best to protect intellectual property and fully exploit digital assets.
“Every organisation should be working on a coherent strategy to address these issues, which in some cases can be a question of ‘adapt or die’. Our report takes a thought provoking and stimulating look at the challenges. I look forward to discussing these further with our clients and contacts in Scotland.”
Part one - Online channels to market, which launched 4 May, suggests that whilst all businesses understand the significant opportunities the internet offers, many feel that they are not able to fully exploit them.
Part two - Cloud computing, which launched 1 June, investigates the opportunities that cloud computing offers businesses, including: cost and time efficiencies; dynamic scalability and flexibility; access to enterprise-level IT resources, and greener use of IT. It also addresses some key challenges, such as data protection and security, and the current lack of consistent, international legal protection.
For more information, or to request a copy of part one, two or three of Shifting Landscapes, please contact: Camillo Fracassini, The BIG Partnership, 0131-555 5522 or email camillo.fracassini@thebigpartnership.co.uk
Or join the Shifting Landscapes LinkedIn group: http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Shifting-Landscapes.
