Company: Law Firm
Industry: Intellectual Property
Client Background
Our client is a Philadelphia-based law firm with a leading intellectual property practice in the United States. The firm helps businesses maximize the value of their intellectual property through strategic counsel on patents, trademarks, copyrights, licensing, technology transfers, IP audits, and IP asset due diligence.
With a large portfolio of intellectual property matters, the firm relied on AppColl, a sophisticated IP management and docketing platform, to maintain critical filing information, deadlines, reminders, client details, and application records. However, the platform’s effectiveness depended heavily on the accuracy and timeliness of the information entered.
Client Challenges
- Inconsistent Docket Maintenance: The firm’s existing in-house resource was not consistently updating and maintaining docket information, resulting in gaps and inaccuracies across critical records.
- Outdated Filing and Deadline Information: Filings, statutory deadlines, reminders, application details, and client information were not always up to date or submitted on time, reducing AppColl’s reliability as a central source of truth.
- Risk of Missed Deadlines: Inaccurate or delayed docket updates increased the risk of missed statutory and procedural deadlines, delayed responses, and incorrect reminders, potentially putting valuable IP rights at risk.
- Excessive Manual Verification: Attorneys and paralegals were required to spend valuable time reviewing and verifying docket information rather than focusing on higher-value legal work and client matters.
- Underutilization of Existing Technology: Although the firm had invested in a powerful IP management platform, inconsistent system management prevented it from realizing the platform’s full potential.
Our Solutions
- Docketing Workflow Assessment: Following onboarding, our supervisor conducted a comprehensive assessment of the firm’s existing docketing workflow. The team identified gaps in data entry, information updates, deadline management, and overall docket maintenance and presented the client with a clear plan of action.
- Experienced AppColl Docketing Support: OBS deployed a dedicated professional with 10+ years of docketing experience, including 4 years of hands-on experience with AppColl. This ensured the firm received specialized IP docketing expertise rather than generic administrative support.
- Process Standardization: Rather than simply assigning a resource to perform docketing tasks, OBS established a structured workflow defining how information would be received, reviewed, entered, updated, and monitored within AppColl.
- SOP Development: We developed standard operating procedures (SOPs) for docketing activities to ensure consistency, accuracy, and adherence to the firm’s requirements. This created a repeatable process that did not depend solely on individual resource knowledge.
- Same-Day Docket Management: The team streamlined daily docketing activities so that critical filings, reminders, client information, and matter details could be updated on the same day, giving attorneys and internal teams more reliable access to current information.
Results Achieved
Within the engagement, OBS transformed the firm’s docketing function from an inconsistent administrative process into a structured, reliable, and timely workflow. The results included:
- Same-day processing of docketing activities, ensuring attorneys had timely access to critical filing, deadline, and matter information.
- Improved accuracy of AppColl records, with filings, reminders, client information, and application details consistently maintained.
- Standardized docketing workflows and SOPs, replacing inconsistent processes with clearly defined procedures.
- Improved deadline visibility, enabling attorneys to proactively review upcoming deadlines and complete filings ahead of due dates.
- Updated bibliographic information, allowing the firm’s team to access relevant client and matter information directly through docket numbers.
- Reduced manual verification and correction efforts, allowing attorneys and paralegals to spend less time monitoring routine docketing activities.
- Greater confidence in docket accuracy, with the firm’s attorneys reporting that they now “blindly trust” the docketing and are highly satisfied with the quality of the service.
Business Impact
As a result, the firm was able to fully leverage its existing AppColl investment instead of replacing or significantly modifying its technology infrastructure.
More importantly, the firm gained greater confidence that critical IP information was being maintained accurately and on time. Attorneys could review upcoming deadlines, access updated matter information, and proceed with filings with greater assurance.
By combining experienced IP professionals, AppColl expertise, standardized processes, and disciplined execution, OBS helped turn the firm’s docketing platform into a dependable operational resource that supports better deadline management, reduces administrative risk, and allows the legal team to focus more on protecting and growing their clients’ intellectual property portfolios.