IP audits for finance professionals: Identifying hidden balance sheet value
As an accountant, financial advisor, or insolvency practitioner, your primary focus is on the tangible financial health of your client's business.
However, a significant percentage of a modern company's true value lies in intangible assets, its intellectual property (IP).
We partner with you to provide a forensic IP audit that translates legal rights into actionable financial data, enabling you to deliver comprehensive, risk-managed advice to your clients.
We operate as a discreet, specialist resource to protect and enhance your primary client relationship.
What is it?
An IP audit, when performed for a finance context, is a systematic and objective review of a business's entire intangible asset portfolio.
Unlike a basic legal check, this process is designed to support financial functions:
- Lending decisions: Confirming the existence and ownership of assets used as collateral.
- Mergers & acquisitions (M&A): Identifying IP assets, ownership defects, and legal risks before due diligence.
- Insolvency: Locating hidden, sellable assets within a distressed business.
- Tax & reporting: Ensuring compliance and accurate accounting for intangible assets.
How we assist you
We provide the definitive IP intelligence needed to inform your financial and commercial recommendations, turning uncertainty into quantifiable data, and value on your balance sheet.
- Risk mitigation: We identify critical risks such as ownership gaps, lapsed registrations, or undisclosed infringement liabilities that could jeopardise a transaction or lending facility.
- Asset discovery: We go beyond registered rights (patents and trade marks) to document unregistered IP (software code, confidential information, goodwill) that holds significant commercial value.
- Documentation for due diligence: We produce comprehensive, legally robust audit reports that satisfy the rigorous demands of institutional investors, lenders, and transaction attorneys.
- Pre-valuation foundation: Our audit provides the factual, legal basis required to support a subsequent, credible IP valuation, giving the financial numbers a legally defensible foundation.
Our unique capability in this area
Our strength in IP audits for the finance sector is our litigation-informed perspective. We don't just find assets; we test them against the legal standards they must meet in a court of law or during a hostile due diligence process.
- Litigation-tested expertise: We scrutinise assignment and employment contracts to confirm legal title, preventing the costly ownership disputes that often derail M&A deals or create post-transaction liability.
- Clarity on risk: Our reports offer clear, commercial language that finance professionals can immediately integrate into risk matrices, valuation models, and lending proposals.
- Speed and focus: For insolvency practitioners, we provide a rapid, targeted IP forensic service to quickly identify and ring-fence valuable assets for urgent sale or liquidation.
IP Audits for Finance Professionals: Common Questions and Answers
Why do I need a specialist IP litigator for a financial IP Audit?
You need a litigator because we know where assets fail in a legal challenge.
We look beyond registration certificates to find the hidden risks, such as defective contractor agreements or ownership ambiguities, that could sink a valuation or expose a client to millions in litigation.
Our expertise is essential for de-risking the balance sheet.
What is the tangible outcome of the audit for our firm and our client?
The tangible outcome is an IP risk and financial roadmap.
This comprehensive report provides clear, legally validated information on asset enforceability, litigation risk exposure, and a clear guide to fixing any defects.
This enables your firm to proceed with confidence in valuation, lending, or M&A decisions.
How does this audit service support an insolvency practitioner?
For Insolvency Practitioners, our audit is critical for speed and realisation value. We rapidly identify all usable, valuable IP assets (including unregistered rights) and immediately assess their legal validity and marketability, ensuring the maximum possible value is realised for creditors in a time-sensitive, distress scenario.
What cost model is typically used for IP Audits for finance firms?
For our professional partners, we usually recommend fixed phase pricing after an initial scoping call.
This provides your firm and your client with absolute budget certainty, allowing you to easily integrate the cost into your overall due diligence or transaction budget without fear of fee escalation.
Should you wish to offer this service to a range of clients, it may be more appropriate for this to be undertaken with banked hours (ringfencing a certain quotient of hours per month) or on a retainer basis.
Partner with specialist IP counsel
Ensure your financial advice is comprehensive and risk-managed by accounting for your client's full intangible asset base. Use the contact form below to arrange a confidential consultation on how we can collaborate.
Additional Relevant Services
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IP Portfolio Valuation: Determining the Commercial Value of Your Assets.
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IP and Investment Due Diligence: Validating Assets Before Capital is Committed.
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IP in Insolvency: Rapid Asset Realisation and Risk Mitigation.
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IP Commercial Strategy and Advice: Turning Assets into Revenue Streams.
The content on this page is provided for general informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. No solicitor-client relationship is created by your use of this site. While we strive to ensure the information is accurate and up-to-date, it should not be relied upon as a substitute for professional legal counsel. For specific advice regarding your legal situation, please contact us directly to arrange a consultation.
Find out more about how we charge for what we do here.