In the weekly IP business talk on LinkedIn the topic of the 17th of February was the IP strategy at Thyssenkrupp. The talk started with an introduction of a case study example from the stair lift business of Thyssenkrupp, which is also part of the IP management education at CEIPI and the distance learning course in IP and the industry 4.0. Here, the use of digital technology was explained with the example of the Microsoft HoloLens to improve the sales process. After this introduction, the CEO of the thyssenkrupp Intellectual Property GmbH, Dr. Stephan Wolke, explained the organization and the IP strategy at Thyssenkrupp. Dr. Wolke is also part of the mentoring program and was industry supervisor of the oral examination of the MIPLM in 2019.

In the introduction an example of the use of IP in the concrete use case of the planning and selling of a stair lift was presented. One aspect which was addressed was the changing use of digital technology in concrete applications. First, the digital technology of the HoloLens was only used as a measuring tool. So, the salesperson who is coming to the customer’s home could use the digital technology to take precise measurements in the staircase of the customer and improve the quality of the planning process and also the construction process of the final staircase. This is the use of digital technology to improve already existing processes.

In the next step the collected data was also used to improve the sales process and introduce a new way to interact with the customer. With the data taken on site, the salesperson could also visualize the planned stair lift on a tablet right at the customer’s home. This helped a lot to first convince the customers that the final product they get is what they want and second also speed up the sales process, so that the stair lift could be installed within 2 weeks instead of months. This example is also explained in the video.

Cannot see the video? Please click: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IgtHnCJJUMU

In the second part of the talk Dr. Wolke explained the organization and the approach to IP strategy at ThyssenKrupp and the more than 350 group companies with more than 100.000 employees. He explained first the IP strategy regarding the management of the huge patent inventory of such a complex group. The first step here was the task to create an effective IP coverage for Thyssenkrupp to protect their businesses and the second step was to make it efficient. The full interview can be found on LinkedIn in the event. Please also have a look at the presented slides of Dr. Wolke: