§Valuation & Commercial Assessment
Patent portfolio pruning, decided before the fee is due
Portfolio Pruning Analytics ranks every patent as a keep, sell, license, or lapse candidate, weighing its next maintenance-fee window against the commercial signals around it. You decide with evidence, months before the deadline.
- Typical turnaround
- 2–4 weeks
- Best for
- Portfolios where fee windows arrive faster than anyone can review them
- You receive
- A ranked candidate list, the scoring model, and a fee-window calendar
- Delivered to
- You and your patent attorney or agent
§ 01Deliverables
What you receive
Ranked candidate list
Every asset placed in one of four candidate groups (keep, sell, license, or lapse) with the reasons in a sentence or two. Candidates, not verdicts: the decision stays yours.
Fee-window calendar
Each upcoming 3.5-, 7.5-, and 11.5-year window, with the fee at your entity status, the surcharge-free dates, and the grace-period end date.
Commercial signal scores
Per asset: forward citations by other companies, filing activity in the same classifications, public product information with features corresponding to claim elements (technical facts only), remaining term, and fit with your roadmap.
Scoring model and weights
The model in a spreadsheet, with every weight visible. If your team values roadmap fit more than citations, change the weight and watch the ranking move.
Sell-before-lapse shortlist
Assets with outside interest but little internal use: candidates for a sale or a licensing campaign while there is still time to run one.
Ledger workspace, if you want it
The results can load into Hoard Ledger, so decisions, windows, and status stay tracked after the project ends.
§ 02Overview
When teams use it
Before the budget cycle
Know next year’s maintenance-fee spend, and which part of it buys strategic value, before the budget is set.
After a strategy shift or acquisition
Product lines change and acquired portfolios arrive unreviewed. Pruning shows which assets still match what you make.
University and lab portfolios
Unlicensed patents approaching a window get a decision: market them, keep them, or let them go. See our support for universities and labs.
Ahead of an 11.5-year window
The largest fee meets the shortest remaining term. That combination deserves a deliberate decision, not a default payment.
§ 03Process
How it works
- 01
Scoping call
A free 20–30-minute call about your portfolio, your goals, and your decision dates. You get a fixed-fee written quote within one business day.
- 02
Build the fee calendar
We pull public status for every asset and lay out each fee window. You confirm entity status and anything the public record can’t show.
- 03
Score the signals
Analysts read each claim set at a technical level and score the commercial signals. A second analyst reviews the ranking.
- 04
Review with your team
We walk through the ranking with you and your counsel, adjust weights where your knowledge beats the public record, and settle the candidate list.
- 05
Act on it
Keep, market, license, or let lapse: your call, documented. Assets you decide to sell can move straight into a sale-readiness package.
§ 04Insight
Sell before you lapse
Patent portfolio pruning usually happens backward. A fee reminder arrives, someone has a few weeks to decide, and the default is to pay. Paying is not wrong. Paying without a reason is.
The fees make the case for deciding early. Under the USPTO fee schedule, a large entity pays $2,150 at 3.5 years, $4,040 at 7.5 years, and $8,280 at 11.5 years. Small entities pay $860, $1,616, and $3,312; micro entities $430, $808, and $1,656. Miss a due date and a six-month grace period follows, with a surcharge of $540, $216, or $108. If the fee and surcharge go unpaid, the patent expires. For 50 large-entity patents reaching the 11.5-year window in the same year, that single round costs $414,000.
Lapsing should be a decision, not an accident. And a patent you no longer need may still matter to someone else. The catch is time: sale-readiness takes 3–4 weeks, marketing campaigns typically run 3–9 months, and many patents never find a buyer. So the moment to ask “sell or lapse?” is about a year before the window, not the week the reminder arrives. Good pruning isn’t about cutting costs. It’s about choosing what grows.
Lapsing should be a decision, not an accident.
§ 05 — Boundaries
What this is not
- Not a legal opinion on the strength, validity, or scope of any patent.
- We don’t pay fees, abandon applications, or file anything with the USPTO. You or your practitioner do.
- Not a valuation of each asset. Rankings are relative; for a value range on selected assets, see Commercial Patent Valuation.
- No promise that a sell candidate will find a buyer.
§ 06Questions
Questions about portfolio pruning
Something else on your mind? Call (505) 357-5188 or write to info@metadragons.com.
How do you decide what counts as a lapse candidate?
An asset lands there when its signals are weak on every axis: little outside citation, no evident products with corresponding features, low fit with your roadmap, and a large fee coming due. It is a candidate group. You and your counsel make the call.
Do you need confidential information?
Public data takes the analysis a long way. Your roadmap and licensing history make it much better. We sign an NDA before any confidential disclosure, and client materials are never used to train AI models.
Do you include foreign family members?
The fee calendar is built around US maintenance-fee windows. Foreign family members appear in the ranking with their public status, so a decision on the US patent reflects the whole family.
What happens to the sell candidates?
If you want to test the market, they can move into Sell Your Patent, starting with sale-readiness. If the evidence is thin, we will say so before you spend more.
Can a lapsed patent be revived?
The USPTO has a petition process for late payment, but whether and how to use it is a question for your registered patent attorney or agent. The better plan is not to need it.
How often should we prune?
Many teams review once a year before the budget cycle, and again ahead of any large window. Hoard Ledger keeps the windows visible in between.
Keep reading
Where to go next
§Next step
Decide before the window opens
Send a patent list or an assignee name. After a free 20–30-minute scoping call, you’ll have a fixed-fee written quote within one business day.